North America-based manufacturers of semiconductor equipment posted $1.41 billion in orders worldwide in July 2014 (three-month average basis) and a book-to-bill ratio of 1.07, according to the July EMDS Book-to-Bill Report published today by SEMI. A book-to-bill of 1.07 means that $107 worth of orders were received for every $100 of product billed for the month.
The three-month average of worldwide bookings in July 2014 was $1.41 billion. The bookings figure is 2.8 percent lower than the final June 2014 level of $1.46 billion, and is 17.1 percent higher than the July 2013 order level of $1.21 billion.
The three-month average of worldwide billings in July 2014 was $1.32 billion. The billings figure is 0.7 percent lower than the final June 2014 level of $1.33 billion, and is 9.4 percent higher than the July 2013 billings level of $1.20 billion.
“Order activity for semiconductor equipment has held at a steady level so far for 2014,” said Denny McGuirk, president and CEO of SEMI. “This trend, along with improvements in semiconductor device sales and unit shipments, is consistent with our outlook for strong equipment sales growth this year.”
The SEMI book-to-bill is a ratio of three-month moving averages of worldwide bookings and billings for North American-based semiconductor equipment manufacturers. Billings and bookings figures are in millions of U.S. dollars.
|
Billings |
Bookings |
Book-to-Bill |
|
| February 2014 |
1,288.3 |
1,295.4 |
1.01 |
| March 2014 |
1,225.5 |
1,297.7 |
1.06 |
| April 2014 |
1,403.2 |
1,443.0 |
1.03 |
| May 2014 |
1,407.8 |
1,407.0 |
1.00 |
| June 2014 (final) |
1,327.5 |
1,455.0 |
1.10 |
| July 2014 (prelim) |
1,317.6 |
1,413.7 |
1.07 |
Source: SEMI, August 2014
This is good news indeed. and hope the trend will continue till end of the year.
SEMI World Fab Forecast report will be published end of the month (this week). I expect the trend to be between 20% to 24% growth for 2014 for semiconductor equipment (new, used and in-house). This is still consistent with the last forecast published end of February. The report covers also over 1150 fabs and any known projects until end of 2015. With all the new fab projects known, 2015 has a good chance to be an all-time record year! Interesting to see how many 200mm facilities are still thriving and are still being built. Maybe we see that IOT-trend begins to have an affect. I also see more activity for memory and analog/power.