Worldwide Chip Sales in May Grew by 2.4 Percent from 2006

Worldwide sales of semiconductors of $20.3 billion in May were 2.4 percent higher than the $19.8 billion reported for May of 2006, and 1.2 percent higher than the $20 billion reported for April 2007, according to the Semiconductor Industry Association (SIA).

"Worldwide sales of semiconductors rebounded slightly in May, after a sequential decline in April," said SIA President George Scalise. "Sales of microprocessors and NAND flash memory saw the largest sales increases, indicating continued strength in end markets for personal computers and cell phones. Average selling prices (ASPs) for DRAMs continued to be under competitive pressure, declining by nearly 14 percent sequentially. Total DRAM sales fell 8 percent even as unit shipments increased by 7 percent. Unit sales of both personal computers and cell phones have increased in line with forecasted growth rates in the 10 percent range, but the memory content of these products is growing dramatically."

Scalise added that according to Micron Technology, the average DRAM content of a PC will increase from 772MB last year to 1,180MB this year—an increase of 53 percent. "The embedded memory content of cell phones is growing even more dramatically: the NAND flash content of the typical cell phone is expected to grow at a compound annual rate of more than 200 percent through 2010," he said

SIA noted that unit sales of digital signal processors (DSPs) grew by slightly more than 5 percent sequentially, indicating that cell phone inventory issues have been resolved. ASPs were down by nearly 1 percent sequentially while unit sales grew by just over 5 percent, for an increase of 4.3 percent.

"Despite severe price pressures on DRAMs and NAND flash, total sales of semiconductors for the first five months of 2007 increased by 3.1 percent from the same period of 2006," Scalise concluded.

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