Equipment bookings fell in February, but B:B above parity
The chip equipment industry closed February in a healthy state, with a Book-to-Bill ratio of 1.24, according to VLSI Research, equipment bookings amounted to $4.67B. They fell 15% from January’s level, but remained robust, registering a year-over-year growth of 42%. Worldwide billings dropped 12.5% from the previous month to $3.75B. They were 1.6% below those from a year ago.
The equipment industry is turning out unusually strong for this time of the year. VLSI Research even revised the January data published last month. Both bookings and billings were revised upwards from $5.1B and $4.2B, respectively. Chip makers thought 2005 will be flat. With the exception of a few, many chip makers kept their capital spending flat, and under-invested in equipment. As utilization rates increased, there began a rush to buy equipment, which is showing up in the strong bookings growth.
Utilization rates did not cool off as expected in February. Front-end utilization hit almost 93%, 1.5 percentage points above the previous month’s level. Test and Assembly were at 95%, also above the January levels.
