World chip sales flat in August
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Q3 inventory corrections put pressure on vendors to perform in Q4
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(InfoWorld) - Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co. Ltd., the world's largest contract chip maker, reported its worst monthly revenue in 20 months on Friday, but analysts applauded the figure as further proof that an industry glut is dissipating. TSMC said its revenue in February hit NT$20.58 billion (US$624.2 million), down 14.3 percent compared to last year and its worst monthly revenue figure since it reported revenue of NT$20.11 billion in June, 2005. Despite the poor showing, analysts said it was a strong figure considering February is a shorter work month, at only 28 days, and that a major holiday, the Lunar New Year, celebrated throughout Taiwan and much of Asia, also slowed work at TSMC factories. Last year, the Lunar New Year, which is usually a week-long holiday in Taiwan, was on Jan. 29. This year, the first day of the Year of the Pig fell on Feb. 18. "I think the February sales figure was fantastic. It was only down about 2 percent from January," said Warren Lau, chip industry analyst at Macquarie Securities Ltd. in Hong Kong. He said TSMC's February revenue was further proof that a chip glut that has hampered the industry for the past several months is nearing an end. But the return to health over the next few months could be specific to TSMC, and not include the wider chip industry. Earlier this week, Advanced Micro Devices Inc. (AMD) said it will miss its revenue goal for the first quarter of 2007, while rival Intel Corp. outlined plans to beat a microprocessor glut and weak corporate demand for PCs by stepping up chip development speeds. The two companies engaged in a price war last year, and continue to suffer as they duke it out in the market, analysts say. Gartner Inc. believes the chip industry won't start to recover from the glut until the second half of this year. Rising inventories in late 2006 caused companies to slow production and ease off on buying new machinery as a drop in orders idled more and more production lines, said David Christensen, a Gartner analyst, in a recent report. "Look for this trend to continue through the first half of 2007, followed by a slow recovery in the second half of the year," he wrote. Last month, the market researcher revised down its revenue growth estimate for the chip industry this year to 6.4 percent, from a previous forecast of 9.2 percent. Gartner estimates chip industry revenue will reach US$259.7 billion this year. Â
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New orders at U.S. factories were unchanged in August, a stronger showing than expected, but they were down after stripping out orders for transportation equipment, a government report on Wednesday showed.
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(InfoWorld) - Falling prices for DRAM chips and microprocessors badly hurt the global semiconductor market, which will likely limp to a sales increase of just 2.5 percent in 2007, according to an analyst report released Thursday. Semiconductor sales were originally expected to rise by 6.4 percent over 2006 levels, according to the study from Gartner. But chip sales in the first quarter of 2007 were more than 5 percent lower than in the fourth quarter of 2006, leading the research company to cut its 2007 market revenue forecast to $269.2 billion. The numbers reflect a continuingÂ price war between Intel and Advanced Micro DevicesÂ (AMD), as the processor vendors struggle for market share. That war has already taken a toll on AMD, which blamed slow chip sales for itsÂ $611 million lossÂ in the first quarter of 2007. Intel, a much larger company, has continued to post profitable quarters, but on May 2 addedÂ another 1,000 layoffsÂ to a corporate reorganization it began in 2006. Conditions areÂ worst of all in the DRAM sectorÂ of the industry, which will see its revenue drop 11.1 percent in 2007 to $30.5 billion, then limp to a smaller decline in 2008, according to Richard Gordon, research vice president at Gartner. The forecast could spell trouble for Samsung Electronics, the world's largest producer of DRAM and NAND flash. However,Â Samsung's pain may be dulledÂ if tumbling chip prices attract consumers into stores, as prices for end-user products using NAND flash memory like PCs, iPods and digital cameras are also expected to drop. In the long run, chip prices will continue to fall throughout 2007 as semiconductor manufacturers try to clear excess chips out of their warehouses, Gordon said. Chip manufacturers do have some cause for optimism, however, as they have already begun to control that inventory by cutting production. If that effort succeeds, the industry could return to modest growth of 8.7 percent in 2008 and 7.2 percent in 2009, he added. Â
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PURE PLAY foundry Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC) said in a statement it had noticed a decline in wafer sales in September, compared to August.
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GLOBAL semiconductor sales rose to Â£10.1 billion in August from the previous month and it appears chip inventories are declining, industry trade group the Semiconductor Industry Association said.
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Chipmaker reports record sales of server and notebook processors, but net income dips.
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Stocks closed little changed on Monday as strength in semiconductor stocks tied to Intel Corp.'s  higher sales outlook offset lingering concerns about the mortgage market.
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U.S. stocks were little changed on Tuesday as a sharp drop in consumer confidence in August stirred fresh doubt about the economy and expectations for Intel to pull in its quarterly revenue forecast weighed on technology stocks.
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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.
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Global semiconductor sales next year are expected to total $215.3 billion, up just 1.2% from this year, according to a forecast released this week by an industry group that tracks global chip sales.
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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 inventories.
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As Intel pursues a new path with improved multi-core chips, AMD says itâs already one step ahead. Intel told the world this week that there is no race to market the next generation of microchips.
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The Semiconductor Industry Association, based in San Jose, Calif., says worldwide sales of semiconductors grew 1.1 percent to $18.
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Samsung Electronics Co., the world&#39;s second-largest semiconductor maker, said it expects global chip sales next year to grow at half of this year&#39;s pace on increased supply from new plants coming online.
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SAN JOSE, Calif. - Amid a lull in the IC market, North American-based manufacturers of semiconductor equipment posted a book-to-bill ratio of 1.00 in August, down from 1.04 in July, according to new figures
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Hit $25bn Global chip sales soared to $20.5bn in August, a new monthly record, according to data from the Semiconductor Industry Association (SIA).â¦