Semiconductor sales jump 17.8% in Q1 to US$123.1 billion
Silicon wafer shipment also hits record
Worldwide sales of semiconductors reached US$123.1 billion in the first quarter of 2021, according to Semiconductor Industry Association (SIA) of the US.
This was an increase of 17.8% from the first quarter of 2020 and an increase of 3.6% over the previous quarter, SIA said.
The figure also beats SIA’s figure for the third quarter of 2018 of US$122.7 billion.
According to SIA, sales for the month of March alone was US$41 billion. For the month, regionally, year-to-year sales increased across all markets: China (25.6%), Asia Pacific and all other (19.6%), Japan (13.0%), the Americas (9.2%), and Europe (8.7%).
“Global semiconductor sales remained strong during the first quarter of 2021, topping sales from the previous quarter and substantially outpacing the total from the first quarter of last year,” said John Neuffer, SIA president and CEO. “Year-to-year and month-to-month sales in March increased across all major regional markets, and demand grew across a range of product categories.”
Last year the worldwide semiconductor market was worth US$440 billion, a 6.8% increase from 2019.
Meanwhile, silicon wafer shipment also reached record figures in the first quarter, according to SEMI.
Shipment reached 3.337 billion inch-square in the quarter, a 14% increase from the first quarter of 2020, the organization said.
Demand from logic semiconductors and foundry was the main contributor to the increase, SEMI said. Recovery of the memory market also helped, the firm added.