At the SEMICON West 2012 exhibition being held this week inSan Francisco, SEMI announced that it projects semiconductor equipment sales will reach $42.4 billion in 2012. According to the mid-year edition of the SEMI Capital Equipment Forecast released today, following a 9 percent market increase in 2011, the equipment market will contract by 2.6 percent in 2012. The year 2012 is likely to be the fourth highest semiconductor capital equipment spending year in history, with higher spending only in 2011 ($43.5 billion), 2007 ($42.8 billion) and 2000 ($47.7 billion). With $33.0 billion for 2012 forecasted for Wafer Processing equipment, it will be the second highest spending year ever for this segment, surpassed only by the $34.3 billion spent in 2011.
Denny McGuirk, president and CEO, SEMI “We expect 2012 to post one of the highest rates of global investment for semiconductor manufacturing equipment. Following a multi-year market expansion, sales will again exceed $42 billion — just one billion short of last year’s spending rate as the industry absorbs new capacity,” said Denny McGuirk, president and CEO of SEMI. “We also forecast accelerated spending to exceed $46 billion in 2013.”
The drivers for this capital investment are consumer demand for tablet, smartphone, and mobile devices, leading chipmakers to continue to purchase manufacturing equipment to keep up with current production opportunities and to be ready to build chips based on new technology in the near-term future.
For more information, see http://www.semi.org/en/MarketInfo