The Semiconductors Market Will Grow Nearly 14% This Year

Demand for semiconductors will remain strong this year, following a 2021 in which the market moved more than half a trillion dollars driven especially by the industrial and automotive sectors.

IDC forecasts worldwide semiconductor revenue to reach $661 billion in 2022, representing year-on-year growth of 13.7%. IC Insights believes the improvement will be 11%.

Chips for 5G phones, gaming consoles, wireless hotspots, data centers and wearables will continue to grow. Although consumer-facing markets could start to slow down in the fourth quarter.

“The global nature of the semiconductor industry has been challenged by COVID-19 and continues to be impacted by regional closures, but we reiterate our outlook for a year of positive growth in 2022,” communicates Nina Turner, director of semiconductor research at consultancy IDC.

” In the longer term,” she adds, “new fabs and investment announcements will add significant capacity and could increase the risk of overcapacity beyond 2023.”

Samsung leads

As of today, Samsung holds the top spot in the vendor rankings. The South Korean company has displaced Intel to second place thanks to the performance of the memory segment. The top 5 is completed by SK Hynix, Qualcomm and Micron.

The top ten semiconductor companies, which also include Nvidia, Broadcom, MediaTek, TI and AMD, control 58 % of the market.

The entry on this list of Taiwan’s MediaTek, which has improved by 61 %, and the American AMD, with an increase in sales of 68 %, occurs to the detriment of Apple and Infineon compared to the previous year’s ranking.

The top 20 vendors account for 76 % of revenues, according to IDC. IC Insights points out that half of the top semiconductor suppliers are fabless companies. A decade ago there were none in the top 10.

Gartner explains that, in general, “the rise of 5G smartphones” as well as the “combination of strong demand and increases in logistics and raw material prices drove up average selling prices for semiconductors” in recent months, and this leads to “significant revenue growth.”

Behind the improvement in the memory segment is DRAM technology and the popularization of telecommuting and hybrid environments, as well as remote learning and online entertainment.

Another significant phenomenon in the semiconductor market is HiSilicon’s poor performance due to Huawei’s decline in handsets. This company’s revenue declined by 81% in 2021, causing it to drop out of both the top 10, top 20 and top 25 vendors.

In its case, this is a direct result of US sanctions and affects China’s own share of the global semiconductor market