WSTS dials down the chip market forecast

 

As recently as March of 2019 WSTS was predicting the global chip market would only fall 3 percent and with memory omitted could even show growth. US-China trade tensions have continued to escalate and cast doubt on the market in 2019.

 

 

WSTS Spring 2019 forecast summary. Note: numbers in the table are rounded to whole millions of dollars, which may cause totals by region and by product groups to differ slightly. Source: WSTS.

 

All markets – both geographic and component type – are expected to contract in 2019 with the exception of discrete semiconductors. The biggest faller geographically is the Americas market set to contract by a quarter. The biggest faller in terms of chip component sector is memory set to contract by 30.6 percent.

 

In 2020 the semiconductor will return to single-digit percentage growth across the board. In terms of component types memory will contribute the highest growth followed by optoelectronics and logic.