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International Technology Roadmap for Semiconductors Explores Next 15 Years of Chip Technology

Report Presents Near and Long-Term Challenges and Opportunities Relating to Smaller, Faster, More Energy Efficient Semiconductors

Published Tuesday, April 1, 2014 10:00 am

by Dan Rosso

WASHINGTON—April 1, 2014—The Semiconductor Industry Association (SIA), representing U.S. leadership in semiconductor manufacturing and design, today announced the release of the 2013 International Technology Roadmap for Semiconductors (ITRS), a collaborative effort that assesses the technical challenges and opportunities for the semiconductor industry through 2028. The ITRS seeks to identify future technical obstacles and shortfalls, so the industry and research community can collaborate effectively to overcome them and build the next generation of semiconductors – the foundation of modern electronics.

“For more than two decades, the Roadmap has played an important role in assessing and improving the future of semiconductor technology,” said Brian Toohey, president and CEO, Semiconductor Industry Association. “The rapid pace of semiconductor innovation has spurred growth in virtually every sector of the global economy, and the ITRS has helped enable this forward march of innovation by keeping the industry focused on the opportunities and challenges that lie ahead. Using the ITRS as a guide, our industry’s brilliant researchers, engineers and scientists will continue to develop next-generation semiconductor technologies that lead to smaller, faster, more efficient and less costly end-use devices. These technology advances will have profound impacts on people across the globe as they are applied to health care, communications, transportation, national defense, clean energy, entertainment, and a range of other applications.”

The ITRS is sponsored by five regions of the world – Europe, Japan, Korea, Taiwan, and the United States – and is led by the International Roadmap Committee. Through the cooperative efforts of the global chip manufacturers and equipment suppliers, research communities and consortia, the ITRS identifies critical gaps, technical needs, and potential solutions related to semiconductor technology. Some key findings and predictions of the 2013 ITRS include the following:

Devices

• The combination of 3D device architecture and low power devices will usher in a new era of scaling identified in short as “3D Power Scaling.” The increase in the number of transistors per unit area will eventually be accomplished by stacking multiple layers of transistors.

• Progress in manipulation of edgeless wrapped materials (e.g., carbon nanotubes, graphene combinations, etc.) offer the promise of ballistic conductors, which may emerge in the next decade.

• There will be two additional ways of providing novel opportunities for future semiconductor products. The first consists of extending the functionality of the CMOS platform via heterogeneous integration of new technologies, and the second consists of stimulating invention of devices that support new information-processing paradigms.

System Integration

• The integration of multiple technologies in a limited space (e.g., GPS, phone, tablet, mobile phones, etc.) has revolutionized the semiconductor industry by shifting the main goal of any design from a performance driven approach to a reduced power driven approach.

• Looking at Long Term Devices and Systems (7-15 years horizon, beyond 2020) the 2013 ITRS reports on completely new devices operating on completely new principles and amenable to support completely new architectures. For instance, spin wave device (SWD) is a type of magnetic logic device exploiting collective spin oscillation (spin waves) for information transmission and processing. SWD converts input voltage signals into the spin waves, computes with spin waves, and converts the output spin waves into the voltage signals.

Manufacturing

• Manufacturing of integrated circuits, driven by dimensional scaling, will reach the few nanometers range well within the 15-year horizon of the 2013 ITRS.

• An addition to the 2013 ITRS edition is a new sub-chapter on big data (BD).The fab is continually becoming more data driven and requirements for data volumes, communication speeds, quality, merging, and usability need to be understood and quantified.

These findings and others were derived from the ITRS technology working groups, each of which coordinates with related teams across disciplines to write reports indicating the state of the current technology, technology challenges, critical needs, potential solutions, and areas of innovation.

To learn more about the ITRS, visit http://www.itrs.net.

http://www.semiconductors.org/news/2014/...echnology/

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Bought this when it was 50 cents paying a 5 cent dividend for 10% yield.
Currently its 82 cents which i feel its above its fair value. I just exited my position, good luck to those still holding ^^

(02-04-2014, 01:51 PM)felixleong Wrote: [ -> ]Bought this when it was 50 cents paying a 5 cent dividend for 10% yield.
Currently its 82 cents which i feel its above its fair value. I just exited my position, good luck to those still holding ^^

Felix,

Excluding dividend, that was a return of 64%.

Congratulations !

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IC Insights Shows Big Changes to 2013 Top 20 Semi Supplier Ranking SK Hynix, MediaTek, Micron, and Qualcomm each registered ≥30% year-over-year growth.

RESEARCH BULLETIN APRIL 1, 2014

http://www.icinsights.com/data/articles/...ts/659.pdf

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It is good to see HIGH Capacity Utilization Rate.
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TSMC capacity booked to the end of 3Q14

Cage Chao, Taipei; Steve Shen, DIGITIMES [Wednesday 2 April 2014]

The production capacity of Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Company (TSMC) has been booked through the end of the third quarter of 2014 thanks to orders from handset solution and PC chip vendors, according to industry sources.

The planned roll-outs of new smartphones by brand handset vendors and the upcoming 4G services in China have pushed chipset solution vendors to place wafer start orders at TSMC, the sources noted.

Consumer IC suppliers are also placing short lead-time orders at TSMC as demand from downstream and end-market device makers is likely to pick up soon, added the sources.

As a result, TSMC's 8- and 12-inch fabs are currently operating at 100% and over 90% of their capacity, respectively, said the sources, adding that the foundry's 20nm and 28nm production lines are fully occupied by orders for smartphone and tablet solutions.

http://www.digitimes.com/news/a20140402PD212.html

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February Semiconductor Sales Up 11.4 Percent Compared to Last Year

February Semiconductor Sales Up 11.4 Percent Compared to Last Year

Sales increase by 18 percent year-to-year in Americas region

Published Friday, April 4, 2014 8:00 am

by Dan Rosso

WASHINGTON—April 4, 2014—The Semiconductor Industry Association (SIA), representing U.S. leadership in semiconductor manufacturing and design, today announced that worldwide sales of semiconductors reached $25.87 billion for the month of February 2014, an increase of 11.4 percent from February 2013 when sales were $23.23 billion. This marks the industry’s largest year-to-year increase in more than three years. Global sales from February 2014 were 1.5 percent lower than the January 2014 total of $26.26 billion, reflecting normal seasonal trends. Regionally, sales in the Americas increased by 18 percent compared to last February. All monthly sales numbers are compiled by the World Semiconductor Trade Statistics (WSTS) organization and represent a three-month moving average.

“The trend lines remain positive for the global semiconductor industry, which has followed record revenues in 2013 with an encouraging start to 2014,” said Brian Toohey, president and CEO, Semiconductor Industry Association. “The Americas market continues to demonstrate impressive growth, while sales in Asia Pacific and Europe also increased substantially year-to-year, and the Japanese market continued its recent rebound.”

Regionally, year-to-year sales increased in the Americas (18 percent), Asia Pacific (12 percent), and Europe (9.6 percent). Sales decreased slightly in Japan (-0.2 percent), but February marked the region’s smallest year-to-year decrease since August 2012. Sales fell across all regions compared to the previous month, as February sales historically are lower than January sales due to seasonal trends.

“The U.S. semiconductor market has been a key driver of global market growth over the last year, and policymakers in Washington can help maintain this momentum by enacting measures that remove obstacles to continued growth,” Toohey continued. “One such obstacle is America’s dysfunctional immigration system, which was revealed again this week when scarce H-1B visas were rapidly claimed by employers. Lawmakers should recognize that outdated immigration policies hamper economic growth and innovation, and they should work together to enact meaningful immigration reform in short order.”

http://www.semiconductors.org/news/2014/...last_year/

Dowload the February 2014 chart and graph here.

http://www.semiconductors.org/clientuplo...elease.pdf

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AMAT retained its No: 1 position in 2013.

Overall 2013 spending declined 11.5% - but for AMAT, the decline in revenue was only 1%.

Market share of the top 10 vendors, now at 70 percent, compared with 68 percent in 2012.

The top five vendors command nearly 57 percent of the total market, up 5 points from the prior year," said Mr. Rinnen. "The advance of these large players symbolizes losses of smaller players in the competitive race and an increasing market dependence on a few vendors in the equipment market."
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Worldwide Semiconductor Manufacturing Equipment Spending Declined 11.5 Percent in 2013, According to Final Results by Gartner

STAMFORD, Conn., April 7, 2014

http://www.gartner.com/newsroom/id/2701117

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AR2013 is out

http://infopub.sgx.com/Apps?A=COW_Prospe...te&F=20004

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Have been going over the AR2013. Here are some key points and my thoughts:

1) Global semiconductor equipment market in decline for 2013 – but UMS managed to increase its revenue by 6%. (Note: AMAT’s revenue declined 1%)
2) Ample Capacity for growth – utilization rate of UMS manufacturing facility currently at 60% to 70% (Comment : I guess no capex for facility expansion would be needed until utilization rate hits 100% – capex for plant & equipment only would be needed)
3) Improved cost efficiency – relocation to Penang has yet to be completed (Comment : still room for improvement)
4) For the year under review, the management had been intensifying its efforts to achieve the goal of expanding of the Group’s clientele base. Under the assistance of Singapore trade bodies as well as UMS’ own business associates, the management had explored various opportunities and will be evaluating each opportunity with prudence. (Comment: has been saying that for years but it sounds more serious this time with intensified efforts being put in to look at expanding clientele base)
5) Outlook: Since the recovery in 4Q2013, the Group continues to experience increased business activities resulting from robust demands in the beginning of FY2014. Additionally, its major customer has also given indications of stronger orders in the coming months. In anticipation of the increasing business volume, the Group had been stocking up its inventory during the last quarter of FY2013. Similarly, many leading institutions have also forecasted 2014 to be a year of growth for the global semiconductor equipment market, expecting improvement of more than 20%. (Comment : it sounds like 1Q and 2Q results are expected to be strong)

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Worldwide Wearable Computing Market Gains Momentum with Shipments Reaching 19.2 Million in 2014 and Climbing to Nearly 112 Million in 2018, Says IDC

10 Apr 2014

FRAMINGHAM, Mass., April 10, 2014 – The worldwide wearable computing market (commonly referred to as "wearables") is finally expanding beyond early adopter status to more functional and stylish lifestyle accessories that are making their way onto the pages of GQ and Shape as well as Computerworld and Wired. According to new research from International Data Corporation (IDC), wearables took a huge step forward over the past year and shipment volumes will exceed 19 million units in 2014, more than tripling last year's sales. From there, the global market will swell to 111.9 million units in 2018, resulting in a CAGR of 78.4%.

Complex accessories (e.g., Nike+ FuelBand, Jawbone UP, and Fitbit devices) will lead the wearables market through 2018 as users continue to embrace their simplicity and low price points. These devices are designed to operate partially independent of any other device, but fully operate when connected with IP-capable devices such as a smartphone, tablet, or a PC. "Complex accessories have succeeded in drawing much-needed interest and attention to a wearables market that has had some difficulty gaining traction," said Ramon Llamas, Research Manager, Mobile Phones. "The increased buzz has prompted more vendors to announce their intentions to enter this market. Most importantly, end-users have warmed to their simplicity in terms of design and functionality, making their value easy to understand and use."

Another segment of the market, smart accessories, will gain momentum through the forecast period and surpass complex accessory shipments by 2018. Similar to complex accessories, with their dependence on connecting with IP-capable devices, smart accessories allow users to add third-party applications that boost features and functions for a more robust experience. While not quite ready for prime time, the smart accessory market will continue to mature as users better understand and accept the value proposition and vendors refine their offerings.

The third segment of the wearables market is smart wearables, such as Google Glass, which function with full autonomy, independent of any other device except to access the Internet. To succeed, smart wearable vendors must convince users to shift to a new user experience while offering them a robust selection of third-party applications. It is not a question of "if," but "when" wearables as a whole will extend into the enterprise.

Finally, according to the latest IDC ConsumerScape 360° survey of more than 50,000 consumers in 26 countries, Samsung, which has already unveiled multiple wearable computing devices, was identified as the most trusted brand for wearables, ahead of Apple, Sony, and Google.

The IDC study, Worldwide Wearable Computing Device 2014-2018 Forecast and Analysis (IDC #247318) presents the five-year forecast for the worldwide wearable computing devices market by product category. The worldwide wearable computing devices market will reach a total of 19.2 million units in 2014, driven primarily by complex accessories such as Fitbit devices, Jawbone's UP bracelet, and Nike+ FuelBand. Smart accessories, such as the Pebble smartwatch, Samsung GALAXY Gear, and the Sony SmartWatch, will also take a giant step forward, but their value proposition has yet to be completely clarified. Finally, smart wearables like Google Glass have yet to reach millions of units shipped. To this end, IDC believes that the runway for smart wearables is long, and it will not be until 2016 that we begin to see millions of units shipping.

http://www.idc.com/getdoc.jsp?containerId=prUS24794914

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