Semiconductor industry back on growth path, IDC estimates 6.9% for 2013

Semiconductor industry is regaining growth, most of the leading semiconductor companies have reported a good quarterly growth in second quarter of year 2013. The growth is not limited to any one segment. The growth is overall; discrete analog, memory, processor and application-specific chips all are growing. Market researcher IDC has forecasted a semiconductor revenue growth of 6.9% in year 2013 to reach a revenue of US$ 320 billion. IDC goes a step further and forecast a growth of 2.9% for the year 2014, where it says "semiconductor revenues to grow 2.9% year over year in 2014 to $329 billion and log a compound annual growth rate (CAGR) of 4.2% from 2012-2017, reaching $366 billion in 2017. " The factors such as slowdown in China, eurozone debt crisis and recession, Japan recession, and the U.S. sequester's impact on corporate IT spending are going to affect the chip industry throughout this year, as per IDC. Though PC market is weak the ASPs of DRAM and NAND is not falling. The fall in chip inventory and the rising demand is reason for the present growth. Nina Turner, research manager at IDC says "Semiconductors for smartphones will see healthy revenue growth as demand for increased speeds and additional features continue to drive high-end smartphone demand in developed countries and low-cost smartphones in developing countries. Lower cost smartphones in developin...