World chip sales break record but miss industry forecast
627576
Growth driven by consumer electronics biz World chip sales totalled $247.7bn last year, the US-centric Semiconductor Industry Association (SIA) said late Friday. Alas that's below the SIA's own full-year sales forecast of $248.8bn, a prediction made only last November.â¦
604240
(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!
348942
Worldwide semiconductor sales rose a scant 1.5 percent in October, to $18.8 billion from $18.5 billion in September, as many chip users pared bloated inventories, the Semiconductor Industry Association said on Friday.
174153
(InfoWorld) - Strong demand for semiconductors has prompted chip makers to spend more on production line equipment than anticipated so far this year, an analyst from Semiconductor Equipment and Materials International (SEMI) said Tuesday. The chip equipment market is on pace to grow 20 percent this year to over $39 billion, said Dan Tracy, senior director of industry research and statistics at SEMI. That figure is higher than the 18 percent year-on-year growth the industry organization forecast in July. The growth rate will make 2006 the second strongest year ever for the industry, after its peak year in 2000. Sales of materials used in the chip making process, such as silicon wafers, are also growing faster than anticipated, Tracy said, and will likely reach a 10 percent year-on-year growth rate, higher than the 7 percent rate SEMI had previously forecast. Japan remains on pace to be the biggest spender on chip equipment this year, accounting for around a fifth of all purchases, followed by Taiwan and South Korea. Around half of all new chip factory projects are in Asia, Tracy said. But there is danger in the strong spending trend. Around 40 percent of all new production lines currently being built will start churning out chips in late 2007, potentially flooding the market with supply, Tracy said. SEMI predicts spending on new chip equipment in 2007 will be flat compared to this year.
442314
SAN JOSE, Calif. - Worldwide semiconductor sales rose 9.2 percent in January, boosted by better-than-expected cell phone shipments and strong sales of personal computers, digital cameras and music players, an industry group said on Monday.
212587
Global semiconductor sales rose 1.1 percent to $18.2 billion in August from the previous month and it appears as though chip inventories are declining, an industry trade group said Thursday.
392709
InfoWorld - Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing (TSMC) posted record sales and net profit in the fourth quarter as demand for chips in communications, computers, and consumer electronics products soared, the company said Thursday.
141096
The chipmaker will post twice the growth of the market average, which will hit $270 billion this year, analysts say.
611264
Chipmakers are again investing heavily to avoid the mistakes of the 1990s. But can they compete with overseas rivals and avoid a glut?
469987
Intel Corp.&#39;s shares climbed nearly 6 percent Friday after saying its fourth-quarter sales are on track to break a company record because demand for the chips that
500269
Worldwide semiconductor sales grew 23.4 percent to &#36;218.5 billion in 2004 despite a significant slowdown in the second half of the year, according to preliminary results released Tuesday by the research firm Gartner Inc.
470681
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¦
530771
Sales of semiconductors in November indicate that consumer products such as LCD (liquid crystal display) TVs, digital music players, and other devices sold well during the holidays, the Semiconductor Industry Association (SIA) said Monday.November chip sales rose 2.3 percent year-on-year to $23.1 billion, the SIA said.Unit demand has far outpaced last year. But falling chip prices have hurt industry revenue, the chip association said. For example, DRAM (dynamic RAM) bit shipments grew 25 percent in the three months through mid-December, but average selling prices have declined 20 percent over the same period.The association also noted that rising energy prices and concerns about the sub-prime lending issue in the U.S. do not appear to have had a significant impact on consumer spending for the holidays, the SIA said. The group reiterated its forecast that worldwide semiconductor sales will reach a new record in 2007. But it will take a stronger than expected December selling season to reach the 3.8 percent growth goal the group had&#160;forecast earlier this year, the SIA said.Investment banking firm Credit Suisse was not as optimistic as the SIA.The November data was below normal seasonal trends, noted analyst John Pitzer, in a report on Monday. Even if December reaches its normal seasonal growth, 2007 industry revenue will only reach $255.7 billion, up 3.2 percent over last year. The growth percentage would fall short of the SIA&#39;s 3.8 percent target.The slow November prompted Credit Suisse to lower its 2008 chip industry revenue forecast to 9.4 percent year-on-year growth, down from a previous target of 13 percent.
700500
With Christmas just 11 days away, you have to wonder what Hector Ruiz is going to find under his tree. It&#8217;s been a terrible year for Advanced Micro Devices, and the chipmaker&#8217;s analysts conference on Thursday did nothing to spread holiday cheer.Confirming what many in the chip world had suspected for some time, CEO Ruiz and other AMD execs fessed up that bugs in its new quad-core Barcelona server and Phenom desktop chips will&#160;delay these key next-generation technologies.The technical problems will delay general availability of the fastest version of the chips for three or four months. Customers willing to settle for slower clock speeds will be able to get the processors sooner; for example, AMD will ship a 2 gigahertz version of the Barcelona first, instead of the expected 2.5 gigahertz speed. In either case, the chips will be close to a year late; the original target date was the first quarter of 2007.AMD STUMBLES AS INTEL SPEEDS AHEADThe problem couldn&#8217;t come at a worse time. AMD has struggled all year to close the performance gap between its high-end chips and Intel&#8217;s. Barcelona, the company had promised, would restore its technical supremacy. Indeed some analysts said they had expected the quad-core server chip to do just that. &#8220;At 2.5 gigahertz it would have beaten any Intel products,&#8221; said analyst Nathan Brookwood of Insight64. &#8220;But at 2 gigahertz, it&#8217;s bringing up the rear,&#8221; he said.Intel, meanwhile, has corrected many of the problems that dogged it earlier in the decade. &#8220;AMD isn&#8217;t competing against the Intel of two years ago,&#8221; said Dean McCarron of Mercury Research. Intel has had quad-core chips in the market for about a year. To be fair, its chips are based on a somewhat simpler design; Intel gets to four cores by packaging two dual-core chips together. By contrast, AMD&#8217;s design integrates four cores on one chip, a more efficient solution, said McCarron. Except that AMD&#8217;s approach reduces yields and thus raises manufacturing costs, he added.There was earlier speculation that Barcelona&#8217;s problems were related to the ATI graphics chipset, but the problem turns out to be deeper, at the chip level. AMD has said it is related to the translation lookaside buffer (TLB) in the processor&#39;s L3 cache.DOUBTS ABOUT A QUICK FIXIn the Thursday conference, analysts had expected discussion of the company&#8217;s &#8220;asset light strategy,&#8221; which will apparently entail outsourcing more manufacturing to foundries such as Chartered Semiconductor or TSMC. But they didn&#8217;t get it, and the lack of details made CEO Ruiz&#8217;s promise to return to profitability in 2008 less credible to Wall Street. AMD&#8217;s financial performance has been terrible, losing money for four straight quarters. Part of the reason: Intel and AMD have engaged in a bloody price war, a struggle that has been very tough on the smaller company&#8217;s profit margins. But the Barcelona and Phenom delays are serious self-inflicted wounds.AMD&#8217;s stock lost another few points yesterday and has now shed about 40% in the last two months and a bone-jarring 56% since the beginning of the year. At $8.84 a share, Thursday&#8217;s closing price, the stock is at its lowest ebb since the summer of 2003. Ironically, AMD has so far&#160;rewarded Ruiz with pay raises.
600265
The world's largest chipmaker posts its best quarterly sales figures, boosting optimism about profit throughout the industry.
427554
Texas Instruments Inc , the  world's top mobile phone chip maker, said on Thursday it  expects global sales for analog chips to double over the next  seven years, fuelled by growing demand for consumer  electronics.
235887
(InfoWorld) - Semiconductor sales in Europe last year grew more slowly than the worldwide average, dragged down by slow growth in microprocessors in the region, according to a report from the European Semiconductor Industry Association. Worldwide sales of semiconductors grew 8.9 percent in 2006 over the previous year, reaching $247 billion in sales. But in Europe, sales were up just 1.6 percent in 2006, the group said. The increase was driven by DSPs (digital signal processors), dynamic RAM, flash memory, discrete devices such as power transistors, and application-specific chips for consumer, automotive and industrial applications. While sales were low in December, they helped boost the yearly figure because they were better than the previous year. In the final month, European semiconductor sales were $3.5 billion, down 5.1 percent over November. However, December sales were up 5.4 percent compared to the same month in 2005. December produced low sales around the world but were still better than 2005. For the month, worldwide semiconductor sales were $21.7 billion, down 3.6 percent compared to November but up 9 percent over December 2005. The report comes amid mixed results from chip makers around the globe for the final quarter of 2006. GermanyâsÂ Infineon Technologies reportedÂ a 27 percent increase in sales for its quarter that ended Dec. 31 compared to the previous year, despite a significant drop in sales from its group that supplies chips for mobile phones. ButÂ Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co. postedÂ a 5.4 percent drop in sales for the same period compared to the corresponding quarter in 2005.