Various media outlets are today carrying an AAP report of a survey that purports to show increased support for the NBN. Had these outlets dug a bit deeper they might have found that the story was somewhat different.
Semi-conductors are in high demand from the leading electronic equipment manufacturers as the enormous worldwide demand for smartphones continues unabated, with Apple leading the way with demand for the chips ahead of Samsung and HTC.
According to its latest report on the semi-conductor market, Gartner says the top electronic equipment manufacturers accounted for US$105.6 billion of semiconductors on a design total available market (TAM) basis — 35 percent of semiconductor vendors' worldwide chip revenue, which represented a year-over-year increase of US$1.8 billion, or 1.8 percent from 2010.
"The major growth drivers in 2011 were smartphones, media tablets and solid-state drives (SSDs)," said Masatsune Yamaji, principal research analyst at Gartner.
"Those companies that gained share in the smartphone market, such as Apple, Samsung Electronics and HTC, increased their semiconductor demand, while those who lost market share in this segment, such as Nokia and LG Electronics, decreased their semiconductor demand. Media tablets were also a growth driver for the semiconductor market throughout 2011."
"Given the rapidly changing competitive structure of the IT and electronics industry, no semiconductor device vendor can afford just to monitor the requirements of the current market leaders. Vendors need to be constantly looking for new market entrants who will, in turn, be tomorrow's market leaders," Yamaji said.
According to Gartner, Apple gained a much greater share of the smartphone market, and its media tablet business was also highly successful in 2011. The analyst firm says that while DRAM prices fell drastically in 2011, and many PC vendors decreased their total semiconductor demand accordingly, the success of the MacBook Air enabled Apple to increase semiconductor chip demand even in its PC business.
Within the top 10 rankings, Gartner reports that three companies were from the Americas, three from Asia/Pacific, three from Japan and one from Europe, the Middle East and Africa (EMEA). Apple led the market in 2011, achieving significant growth, as it has done for the past five years. As a result, says Gartner, Apple became the biggest customer of semiconductor chip vendors in 2011, climbing two places in the ranking, from third in 2010.
According to Yamaji, as more brand-name companies are increasing their production outsourcing to original design manufacturers (ODMs) and electronics manufacturing services (EMS) providers, “semiconductor procurement by ODMs and EMS providers has increased year over year. Currently, three of the top 10 purchasing TAM companies are so-called contract manufacturers.”
"Semiconductor chip vendors must pay attention not just to the design TAM and purchasing TAM by company, but also by region. This is the key to avoiding inappropriate sales resource allocation. They must keep an eye on design-win opportunities in the US, while also establishing a strong distribution network in China."
Table:
Top 10 Semiconductor Design TAM by Company, Worldwide 2011, Preliminary (Millions of Dollars) Rank
Note: TAM = total available market. Design TAM represents the total silicon content in all products designed by a certain electronic equipment manufacturer or in a certain region, while purchasing TAM represents the total silicon content purchased directly by a certain electronic equipment manufacturer or in a certain region.
David Frost
| SYDNEY, Feb. 22, 2012—Silver Peak Systems, the leader in data centre class wide area network (WAN) optimisation, today continues to revoluti…
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