The semiconductor industry always surprises. Now, when gloomsters from economists to politicians to bankers to retailers to manufacturers and pundits are predicting a bleak economic year, the semiconductor industry is booming.
Analysts, IC Insights estimate growth for the semiconductor industry's top 20 companies was up 10 per cent on H107.
That's even when you've got Hynix dragging down the average with a 23 per cent fall in revenues, and stagnant sales at Micron and Toshiba.
The memory guys' limpness was compensated by stellar performances from TSMC which grew 35 per cent, Matsushita which grew 26 per cent, Qualcomm which grew 25 per cent, Nvidia which grew 23 per cent, Samsung which grew 21 per cent, Broadcom which grew 20 per cent, and Infineon which grew 19 per cent
Then came the WSTS figures for June which showed that June's semiconductor sales were up 12.2 per cent compared to June 2007, driving Q208 growth to a 3 per cent increase on Q108 growth.
If you exclude memories, the market was up 18.1 per cent in value versus June 2007, driven by an 11.2 per cent increase in units and 6.2 per cent growth in ASPs.
In May (including memories) the market was up 8.4 percent compared with the market in May 2007. In April (including memories) the market was up 5.3 percent compared with April 2007.
With the IMF's upward revision of world GDP growth from 3.7 to 4.1 per cent, Q3 growth should top 10 per cent quarter on quarter, reckons
"These results are outstanding, way better than even we dared to expect less than two weeks ago", said Penn, who's forecasting 12 per cent growth for the semiconductor industry this year.
Clearly, instead of the financial industry analysts trying to tell the semiconductor CEOs how to run their companies, the semiconductor guys should really be running the financial industry.
Leave a comment