News Article
Japan Snatches Share From U.S. And European Semiconductor Equipment Suppliers
In 2011, TEL, Hitachi and Ulvac were some of the companies who increased their market share in Plasma Etch, PVD and RTP/Diffusion, although ASML remained the key player in Lithography
Although the yen currency remained weak in 2011, Japanese semiconductor equipment suppliers gained share from t U.S manufacturers.
This is according to the Information Network report, "Applied Materials: Competing for World Dominance."
"Although the Yen decreased more than 9% against the dollar between 2010 and 2011, many Japanese companies were still able to increase their market share against U.S. and European suppliers," notes Robert Castellano, President of The Information Network, "except of course the Lithography sector that ASML dominated."
In 2011, ASML held a whopping 57.0% in Lithography, while Nikon and Canon held only 27.8% and 15.2% share respectively.
In Plasma Etch, TEL increased its share of the more than $4 billion sector slightly, from 23.5% in 2010 to 26.3% in 2011. And Hitachi High Tech more than doubled its share in the market, from 5.7% in 2010 to 11.8% last year.
In Physical Vapor Deposition (PVD), Ulvac increased its share of the $1.5 billion sector from 8.4% in 2010 to 11.5% in 2011.
In Rapid Thermal Processing (RTP)/diffusion, Hitachi Kokusai increased its share of the $1 billion sector from 7.9% in 2010 to 9.4% in 2011.
So, what implications does this hold? Information Network says that the semiconductor equipment market will drop as much as 10% in 2012. So far, the Yen/USD exchange average has not depreciated against the dollar, meaning revenues based on the U.S. dollar can increase an additional 10% if you consider what happened to the exchange rate in 2010.
Although the Information Network predicts that semiconductor sales are projected to grow only about 2 percent in 2012, up to now, they are still declining. Infact, overall capex is expected to suffer even more and drop by as much as 10-12 percent. This is despite the capex announcements from three of the biggest companies, Intel, Samsung, and TSMC seem overinflated.
At the end of the day, this means that 2012 could be another year of share gains for some semiconductor equipment manufacturers even though the overall equipment market is down.
