June 30, 2003 – Domestic orders for Japanese chipmaking equipment jumped 35% from April to May of this year, and was up 88.2% from May 2002, according to data from the Semiconductor Equipment Association of Japan.

Global orders, however, fell for the third straight month, down 11.8% to 98.8 billion yen, partly due to the boom in orders in the spring of 2002.

The book-to-bill ratio spiked to 1.04 in May from 0.78 in April — meaning that $104 worth of new orders were received for every $100 of product billed for the month. For the 12-month period since May 2002, the book-to-bill rose to 1.43 from 1.15.