Asia-Pacific semiconductor revenues up 48% to US$33.5b

Asia-Pacific semiconductor revenues up 48% to US$33.5b

SINGAPORE (AFP): Asia-Pacific semiconductor sales grew by 48 percent year-on-year to US$33.5 billion in 1995, confirming the region as the world's most dynamic chip market, figures made available here yesterday showed.

Preliminary 1995 figures released by the U.S. market research agency Dataquest Inc. showed the regional semiconductor market rose from $22.58 billion in 1994 and its share of world consumption to an unprecedented 22 percent.

"Asia-Pacific's exceptional semiconductor market performance in 1995 is attributed to the rapid expansion of high-end productions in the computer industry," J.H. Son, chief of Dataquest Asia-Pacific, said in a statement.

He said the "accelerated evolution of communications equipment, especially mobile-communication manufacturing, and a continuous increase in foreign expansion and investments in local manufacturing" spurred the growth.

South Korea's Samsung Corp. became the Asia-Pacific's largest semiconductor maker in terms of revenue with sales of $2.68 billion, pushing Toshiba Corp. of Japan to second place with $2.25 billion in sales.

Samsung's revenues grew by 68 percent year-on-year, but its growth was dwarfed by another Korean conglomerate, Hyundai Corp., which saw revenues grow 187 percent to $1.55 billion.

U.S. chip giant Intel was in third place with revenues of $2 billion, followed by Texas Instruments with $1.78 billion and NEC Corp. of Japan with $1.61 billion.

"Asia-Pacific companies played the leading part in the region's growth as well as in foreign markets," Dataquest said.

"Consequently, total worldwide revenues for Asia-Pacific companies led all regions with an 84-percent growth rate and increased world market share from 9.2 percent to 12.0 percent in 1995," it said.

In terms of share of global revenue, North American companies dominate the world semiconductor market with a 40-percent share, followed by Japanese companies with 39.4 percent.

Asia-Pacific companies excluding Japanese firms are in third place, having more than tripled their share of the world semiconductor market from 3.9 percent in 1990.

Dataquest, headquartered in California, provides market research services on the semiconductor, computer systems and peripherals, communications, software and services sector of the information-technology industry.