IHS Markit, London, credits explosive growth in enterprise and storage as the main driver of the semiconductor market’s record revenue in the second quarter of 2018. According to Ron Ellwanger, senior analyst at IHS.“ This growth contributed to record application revenue in data processing and wired communication markets as well as in the microcomponent and memory categories.”
Global semiconductor industry revenue grew 4.4 percent quarter over quarter in the second quarter of 2018, reaching a record $120.8 billion. Growth occurred in all application markets and world regions, with sequential microcomponent sales up 6.5 percent, and memory semiconductor revenue up 6.4 percent. “Broadcom Limited experienced exceptional growth in its wired communication division, due to increased cloud and data-center demand,” Ellwanger said.
Memory component revenue continued to rise in the second quarter, compared to the previous quarter, reaching $42.0 billion dollars. “This is the ninth consecutive quarter of rising revenue from memory components, and growth in the second quarter of 2018 was driven by higher density in enterprise and storage,” Ellwanger said. “This latest uptick comes at a time of softening prices for NAND flash memory. However, more attractive pricing for NAND memory is pushing SSD demand and revenue higher.”
Samsung Electronics continued to lead market share in the overall semiconductor industry in the second quarter with 15.9 percent of the market, followed by Intel at 13.9 percent and SK Hynix at 7.9 percent. Quarter-over-quarter market shares were relatively flat, with no change in the top-three ranking. SK Hynix achieved the highest growth rate and record quarterly sales among the top three companies, recording 16.4 percent growth in the second quarter.
