Chip sales slow in August
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With the economy slowly turning up, upgrading hardware has been on businesses radar in the past 12 months as their number two priority.
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Semiconductor sales worldwide surged to a monthly record of $20.5 billion in August, fueled by higher demand for memory chips used in PCs and mobile gadgets such as cellphones and digital cameras, an industry group reported yesterday.
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Sales of new single-family U.S.  homes fell 8.3 percent in August to a 795,000 annual sales  pace, its slowest rate in over seven years, while the inventory  of homes dropped, a Commerce Department report showed on  Thursday.
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WASHINGTON - Retail sales slid in August as people steered away from buying cars and shoppers kept a close eye on their spending after splurging in July.    The Commerce Department reported retail sales fell by 0.3 percent in August, following a 0.8 percent gain the previous month...
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So much for Intel, AMD price cuts World chip sales grew a little in July, with sale up just 1.8 per cent on the previous month's figure, the US Semiconductor Industry Association (SIA) reported this past Friday. Sales for the month total $20.1bn.â¦
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The August start of the back-to-school shopping season was a disappointment for major retailers, delivering the industry a third straight month of tepid sales and its weakest gain in almost a year and a half. Higher gasoline prices and consumers' ongoing worries about jobs contributed to the poor showing.
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Retail sales were weaker than expected in August; confidence wanes.
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(InfoWorld) - The global chip market is suffering from falling prices in microprocessors and memory chips, bad news for companies but great for users. Steep declines in DRAM (dynamic RAM) for PCs and NAND flash memory, used in a variety of gadgets including digital cameras and iPods, as well as microprocessors prompted the Semiconductor Industry Association (SIA) to slash its global sales forecast for this year to US$252 billion, just 1.8 percent growth compared to last year. The previous estimate called for sales growth of 10 percent this year. Sales of gadgets themselves are on track to meet forecasts, however, SIA said. Chip shipments overall remain healthy, as does end-user demand. But prices continue to fall for a variety of reasons, including a glut in the memory market and a price war between Intel Corp. and Advanced Micro Devices Inc. in microprocessors. "End markets continue to be strong, with consumers realizing major benefits from lower chip prices coupled with ever-increasing performance and functionality from advances in chip technology. Despite a forecast of slower growth, we expect that global sales of microchips will surpass last yearâs record level," the SIA said in a statement on Wednesday. Intel and AMD have been battling each other through price reductions for over a year now, and reports indicate that Intel will cut prices on some microprocessors again in late July. The price war has been good to consumers, delivering more technically advanced microprocessors at a lower cost. Microprocessors are generally the most expensive chip inside a PC. The DRAM market has been hit the worst. The price of mainstream 512M-bit second-generation double data rate (DDR2) DRAM that runs at 667MHz has plunged 72 percent so far this year to US$1.79 per chip, according to DRAMeXchange Technology Inc., a Taiwanese clearinghouse for the chips. The market research division of the company has noted that the chips appear to be bottoming out, and that prices could tick up a bit later this month. DRAM price reductions for users normally come a few weeks or a month after the spot DRAM market falls. NAND Flash memory has suffered a similar fate as DRAM, but not quite as steep a decline. A glut of the chips early in the year has been wiped out by memory makers, which tweaked production lines to make more DRAM instead of NAND flash. Prices of 8G byte NAND has fallen 18 percent his year to US$9.26, according to DRAMeXchange, while the 4G byte capacity has dropped nearly 15 percent to US$5.69. The SIA expects PC and mobile phone sales to rise 10 percent each this year. Mobile phone sales may give chips a bigger boost, however, because users are buying more 3G (third generation communications) handsets, which contain more chips than older phones. Sales of personal media players and digital music players are expected to grow by more than 20 percent this year, SIA said, but noted that price competition in the market will likely keep NAND flash chip prices tame. The SIA report followsÂ a similar estimation of the global chip industry by Gartner. A few weeks ago, the market researcher lowered its forecast to just 2.5 percent growth to US$269.2 billion this year, down from an earlier estimate of 6.4 percent. Â ADVERTISEMENTIBM Information On Demand 2006Industrial Industry Leaders, please join us at IBM's premier information management global event, IBM Information On Demand 2006, October 15-20, Anaheim, CA. More IBM business and technical solutions content in one place than ever before! Select from  over 800 sessions. Register today!
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Computer chip sales have  recovered from a "hiccup" caused by anxiety surrounding the  Nov. 2 U.S. presidential election, an Advanced Micro Devices  Inc. AMD.N executive said on Tuesday.
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Advanced Micro Devices has been facing profit pressure--but new chipmaking techniques are giving it more room to lower prices.
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SAN JOSE, Calif. - The Semiconductor Industry Association (SIA) said worldwide sales of semiconductors rose to $18.2 billion in August, exceeding expectations of $18 billion (see Tuesday, Sept.
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Major automakers posted mixed U.S.  sales for August on Tuesday, as executives cautioned the  embattled industry was facing reverberations from a weaker  housing market and the shakeout in subprime lending.
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Shares of Advanced Micro Devices   fell more than 10 percent on Friday after the computer  chip maker forecast quarterly revenue below market expectations  amid a price battle with larger rival Intel Corp..
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Retail sales in August posted the weakest showing in two months as worried consumers curbed their spending habits.
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(InfoWorld) - Global PC sales have slowed a tad over the past few weeks as the market waits for Intel to announce new price reductions, market researchers said. The world's largest chip maker is widely expected to publish a new price list on July 22 that shows lower prices for microprocessors aimed at the desktop PC market. The company regularly updates its pricing, but doesn't disclose when or how much prices will change, an Intel spokesman said Thursday. Still, PC makers in Taiwan, as well as analysts and market researchers said they receive word of price changes ahead of time, and that the expected Intel price reductions were the reason Advanced Micro DevicesÂ announced microprocessor price cuts earlier this month. AMD slashed prices on its top-of-the-line desktop PC microprocessors by a few hundred dollars, and now offers six AMD Athlon dual-core microprocessors for below $100 each. The AMD move was aimed atÂ pre-empting Intel's anticipated July reductions, according to a report by investment banking firm Goldman Sachs Group. The expected price cuts are a continuation of Intel's battle for market share against rival AMD. It's a fight that has been great for users, particularly in desktop PCs. Microprocessors are among the most expensive parts in a PC, so price cuts on the chips usually lead to better deals for users, either on lower PC prices or more add-ons, such as better DVD drives, more memory, or larger hard disks. The market share battles have also prompted both Intel and AMD to boost technology, resulting in more bang for a user's buck. The price war hasn't been so good for the companies. Intel's stock fell 4.8 percent to end at $25.06 per share on the NASDAQ stock exchange Wednesday, a day afterÂ the company reportedÂ a lower than expected profit margin for the second quarter. Analysts blamed the price war. The fight with Intel has caused AMD to report weaker earnings in recent quarters, and analysts are not optimistic about its second quarter earnings, which it will report later Thursday in the U.S. "We believe the worse than expected gross margin, higher than expected R&D [research and development] spending and low quality earnings leverage (tax rate changes, sold depreciation, etc.) will cast a shadow over [Intel's] stock," wrote Michael Masdea, chip analyst at Credit Suisse Securities (USA), in a recent report. He predicted that Intel gained market share on AMD in the second quarter, based onÂ its earnings report. Market researchers were not able to say exactly how muchÂ the PC marketÂ has slowed over the past few weeks, but indicated that the weaker sales have shown up in various places in the PC component supply chain. Slower trading in the DRAM (dynamic RAM) market, for example, caused prices to drop last week, according to DRAMeXchange Technology, which runs an online DRAM trading site. The company blamed the anticipated Intel price adjustments for the declines. Â
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U.S. manufacturing expansion slowed in  August from the previous month as a decline in new orders had  factory managers opting for caution, according to the Institute  for Supply Management on Tuesday.
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Advanced Micro Devices Inc. warned Monday that it was unlikely to meet its first-quarter revenue guidance of $1.6 billion to $1.7 billion, the latest in a series of disappointments for investors in the struggling chip-maker. The company's stock fell to a new 52-week low on the news.