March 28, 2005 – The top two Japanese chipmakers sank in the 2004 global semiconductor sales rankings, while Texas Instruments and Infineon Technologies of Germany advanced, according to iSuppli Japan KK, the Japanese unit of U.S. market survey company Isuppli Corp, said the Nihon Keizai Shimbun America.

The rankings, which were released Friday, show Renesas Technology Corp. of Japan falling from third in 2003 to fifth despite its worldwide sales rising 12.9% to 9 billion dollars. Toshiba Corp. dropped from fifth to seventh with sales of 8.75 billion dollars, up 15.6%. NEC Electronics Corp. was unchanged at eighth, posting a 14% sales increase to 6.5 billion dollars.

Texas Instruments rose from fourth to third on strong sales of processors for cell phones. The US firm’s sales surged 30.3% to 10.22 billion dollars. Infineon Technologies saw its ranking climb from seventh to fourth on a 29.1% sales increase to 9.18 billion dollars.

The sharpest sales growth among the world’s top 10 semiconductor makers in 2004 was recorded by Samsung Electronics Co. of South Korea, which rang up 15.75 billion dollars in sales for a 58% increase. Intel Corp. remained securely at the top, with sales of 31.34 billion dollars, up 15.9%.

Aggregate global chip sales in 2004 came to 227.24 billion dollars, a 24% jump from 2003.