One of the interesting things about this financial downturn is that no one really has a clue what's going to happen.
Projections swing from the most pessimistic one of full-scale depression, to fairly mild projections of low single digit GDP decline for next year with growth resuming in 2010.
On this scale of total gloom to mild downturn, the US Semiconductor Industry Association has gone fairly gloomy expecting a 2.2 per cent downturn this year and 5.6 per cent downturn next year.
On the other hand the SIA gets quite skittish about 2010 (up 7.4 per cent) and 2011 (up 7.5 per cent).
How can the SIA possibly know what will happen in 2010?
On the relatively jolly side, Europe's leading semiconductor analysts, Future Horizons, reckon we'll still see growth this year (2.2 per cent) but will have a 2 per cent dip in 2009.
US analysts iSuppli reckons there will be a 2 per cent decline this year whileWorld Semiconductor Trade Statistics reckons there'll be a 2 per cent rise. You take your pick.
I wish I could be as certain about anything as these analysts seem to be about everything.
I would be interested to see what the analysts have been saying in previous years and what actually happened, say over the last 5 years. These guys pump out predictions every ΒΌ looking forward for a few years. Would be interesting to see how good they are!
That would depend on whether you take their Q1 forecast or their Q4 forecast. By Q4 they might be somewehere in the ball-park. In Q1 they're usually out in some parallel universe.
Maybe best not to look now - it'll give you a bit of a shock - but when you're feeling up to it, just look at these analysts' Q1 forecasts for semiconductor growth in 2008:
Cowan LRA 6.8%; Databeans 8.7%; Future Horizons 10%; Gartner Dataquest 6.2%; IC Insights 10%; IDC 6%; Inside Chips 8% decline; International Business Strategies 4%; iSuppli -7.5%; Semico 12%; SIA 7.7%; VLSI Research 7.5%; WSTS 9.1%.
Reminds me of when I questioned one market analyst (no naming and shaming) as to why his previous figures for the year for semis were so far out.
His reply? "I'm afraid the industry let us down!"
Nice one, Dave. Give my best to Malcolm when you see him
"" One of the interesting things about this financial downturn is that no one really has a clue what's going to happen. ""
There will be one thing for sure.....
Lots of predictions will be made but each will be time limited before it then automatically and in-evitably becomes in-accurate.
This prediction will self destruct in.... well you predict that for me....
Now that it's ensconced on our server it is preserved for all time