2009 ending with lot of positives for global semiconductor industry

Friends, I’ve been receiving lot of information lately regarding the state of the global semiconductor industry. Let me share some of those with you, here.

First, from my favorite, IC Insights. It said recently that after the slump of 2009, the electronics systems sales is likely to set new sales record in 2011!

Following the worst economic recession in over six decades, global sales of electronics systems are projected to fall 11 percent in 2009 to $1.11 billion from a record-high $1.24 billion in 2008, according to the just-released 2010 edition of IC Insights’ Integrated Circuit Market Drivers report. This year’s drop is only the third annual decline in the history of electronics systems sales — following 2001 and 2002.

According to IC Insights, the electronics equipment market is forecast to rebound in 2010 with the total value of systems shipments growing 7 percent to $1.19 billion. Another 9 percent increase in systems sales is expected in 2011, which will push global electronics equipment revenues to a new record-high $1.29 billion. IC Insights sees 2010 recovery year being led by 9 percent rise in revenues for communications systems and automotive electronics.

Next, from iSuppli, another one of my favorites. It reported that following a strong performance in the global NAND flash memory market in Q309, Japan’s Toshiba Corp. led the way with its revenue improving by nearly 50 percent during the period. Wonderful!

Incidentally, the global NAND flash memory revenue in Q3 rose to $3.94 billion, up 25.5 percent from $3.1 billion during Q2. That’s excellent!

Here’s another one — from SEMI, which recently reported that the global semiconductor manufacturing equipment billings had reached $4.54 billion during Q309. This figure is 69 percent higher than the second quarter of 2009, but 31 percent less than the same quarter a year ago. Nevertheless, this news is also encouraging!

Also, Gartner reported that global semicon revenue had declined $29 billion in 2009, with revenue totaling $226 billion in 2009, an 11.4 percent decline from 2008. Now, this is expected, given the tough year we have had. Here are Gartner’s top 10 global semicon vendors.

I have another release, this one from the venture capitalists (VC) community — the Venture View 2010, the annual predictions survey conducted by the National Venture Capital Association (NVCA).

Clean technology is likely to be industry where most VCs predict growth with 54 percent forecasting higher investment levels in 2010. Other favorable industries include Internet (46 percent predicting higher investment levels), Media and Entertainment (33 percent) and Software (32 percent).

The semiconductor industry is the sector in which most VCs believe we’ll see a decrease next year. Sixty-four percent predict lower investment levels in 2010.

Many venture capitalists believe that the wireless sector will experience declines with 37 percent predicting lower levels for next year as well.

Well, I don’t quite agree!

Especially, with regard to semiconductor and wireless. However, it is evident that VCs are looking at segments where they can get returns much faster, and that’s quite understandable.

Finally, borrowing a quote from Future Horizons’ Malcolm Penn from last month, where he said, “We now see the market declining only 10 percent over 2008, a truly remarkable recovery considering the abyss we were staring into just this time last year.”

So true! Who would have imagined such positive news, as above, to have come out during the end of 2009 — by far, the worst year in this decade for the global semiconductor industry. Still, the VCs don’t want to invest here? Why? Perhaps, they have either miscalculated or did not expect the recovery to be as swift as it has been so far!

The year is ending with a lot of positives for the global semiconductor industry. Let’s hope for a strong performance in 2010. I leave it to all of the pessimists to keep searching for negatives! In the meantime, I will bask in the glory of all the positives signs currently emanating from the global semiconductor industry.