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Commentary / Analysis

• Silicon Wafer Shipments Edge Higher in First Quarter 2021 to Set New Record, SEMI Reports (Monday May. 03, 2021)
  Worldwide silicon wafer area shipments increased 4% to 3,337 million square inches in the first quarter of 2021 compared to the fourth quarter of 2020, topping the previous historical high set in the third quarter of 2018.
  
  
• FPGAs in the Storm (Monday May. 03, 2021)
  The 35-year-old field programmable gate array (FPGA) is one of the most impressive semiconductor devices ever created, short of the central processing unit (CPU).
  
  
• Q1 Global Semiconductor Sales Increase 3.6% Over Previous Quarter (Monday May. 03, 2021)
  SIA today announced worldwide sales of semiconductors totaled $123.1 billion during the first quarter of 2021, an increase of 3.6% over the previous quarter and 17.8% more than the first quarter of 2020.
  
  
• Fabless Suppliers Held a Record 33% of the 2020 IC Market (Thursday Apr. 29, 2021)
  IC Insights’ April Update to the 2021 McClean Report describes how the sales growth rates of fabless IC companies versus IDM (integrated device manufacturers) IC suppliers have historically been very different .
  
  
• ARM pushes chiplets and 3D packaging for Neoverse chips (Wednesday Apr. 28, 2021)
  ARM has launched an enhanced mesh interconnect IP for its high performance Neoverse processor cores that enables more use of chiplets and 3D packaging.
  
  
• Nvidia-ARM deal runs into security issues in the UK (Monday Apr. 26, 2021)
  The UK government has issued a public interest intervention notice instructing investigators to look into Nvidia's proposed $40 billion acquisition of ARM from SoftBank.
  
  
• Alphawave IP plans move to UK for $4.5bn IPO (Friday Apr. 23, 2021)
  Alphawave IP of Canada plans UK flotation and Cambridge design centre in a move that would value the company at US$4.5bn.
  
  
• TSMC Boosts Capital Budget Again, to $30B (Monday Apr. 19, 2021)
  Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co. (TSMC) has again raised its 2021 capital expenditure target to $30 billion after customer demand exceeded the company’s expectations three months ago.
  
  
• 2020 Global Semiconductor Equipment Sales Surge 19% to Industry Record $71.2 Billion, SEMI Reports (Monday Apr. 19, 2021)
  Worldwide sales of semiconductor manufacturing equipment surged 19% from $59.8 billion in 2019 to a new all-time high of $71.2 billion in 2020, SEMI, the industry association representing the global electronics product design and manufacturing supply chain, reported today.
  
  
• Chinese Companies Hold Only 5% of Global IC Marketshare (Wednesday Apr. 14, 2021)
  Propelled by 50% share of IDM sales and 64% share of fabless sales, U.S. companies captured 55% of the total worldwide IC market in 2020.
  
  
• ESD Alliance Reports Strong Electronic System Design Industry Revenue Growth for Q4 2020 (Tuesday Apr. 13, 2021)
  Revenue increased 15.4% in Q4 2020 to $3,031.5 million, compared to $2,626.3 million in Q4 2019, representing only the fourth time since 2011 that year-over-year growth exceeded 15%.
  
  
• Globalfoundries to IPO at a $20bn valuation (Monday Apr. 12, 2021)
  Preparations are going ahead for a $20 billion IPO of Globalfoundries, reports Bloomberg.
  
  
• China lawsuits threaten Nvidia-Arm deal (Monday Apr. 12, 2021)
  The takeover of Arm by Nvidia could be delayed by lawsuits filed by Arm China against three executives appointed by the board to replace CEO Allen Wu.
  
  
• Gartner Says Worldwide Semiconductor Revenue Grew 10.4% in 2020 (Monday Apr. 12, 2021)
  Worldwide semiconductor revenue totaled $466.2 billion in 2020, an increase of 10.4% from 2019, according to final results by Gartner, Inc.
  
  
• Globalfoundries CEO Caulfield Stands Up for the 70% (Monday Apr. 12, 2021)
  GlobalFoundries CEO Tom Caulfield argues that GF has a big role to play in global manufacturing, as making chips becomes a political issue.
  
  
• Startup Transforms Compute-In-Memory (Thursday Apr. 08, 2021)
  At the TinyML Summit, early-stage analog AI accelerator startup Areanna presented the first public reveal of its architecture, disclosing some of the features of its 40 TOPS/W SRAM array-based design.
  
  
• Semiconductor Units Forecast To Exceed 1 Trillion Devices Again in 2021 (Wednesday Apr. 07, 2021)
  Total semiconductor unit shipments, which include integrated circuits as well as optoelectronics, sensor/actuator, and discrete (O-S-D) devices, are forecast to rise 13% in 2021, to 1,135.3 billion (1.1353 trillion) units to set a new all-time annual record
  
  
• Global Semiconductor Sales Up 14.7% Year-to-Year in February (Tuesday Apr. 06, 2021)
  SIA today announced global semiconductor industry sales were $39.6 billion for the month of February 2021, an increase of 14.7% over the February 2020 total of $34.5 billion, but 1.0% less than the January 2021 total of $40.0 billion.
  
  
• Intel 2.0 (Tuesday Mar. 30, 2021)
  Thankfully, I am not in the shoes of Intel’s new CEO, Pat Gelsinger. He obviously relishes it, but very few are quite up to his new challenge.
  
  
• Intel Drops a Bomb, Not the Ball (Friday Mar. 26, 2021)
  Intel rewarded the patient this week as Pat Gelsinger made some very big announcements about the formation of a standalone foundry business, increased partnerships with TSMC for manufacturing of Intel processor products, and a huge promised investment in new manufacturing plants in Arizona.
  
  
• Revenue of Top 10 IC Design (Fabless) Companies for 2020 Undergoes 26.4% Increase YoY Due to High Demand for Notebooks and Networking Products, Says TrendForce (Thursday Mar. 25, 2021)
  The emergence of the COVID-19 pandemic in 1H20 seemed at first poised to devastate the IC design industry. However, as WFH and distance education became the norm, TrendForce finds that the demand for notebook computers and networking products also spiked in response, in turn driving manufacturers to massively ramp up their procurement activities for components.
  
  
• North American Semiconductor Equipment Industry Posts February 2021 Billings, Surpassing $3 Billion for Second Consecutive Month (Thursday Mar. 25, 2021)
  North America-based manufacturers of semiconductor equipment posted $3.14 billion in billings worldwide in February 2021 (three-month average basis), logging a record high for the second consecutive month
  
  
• Intel Surprises with $20B Expansion of Foundry Business (Wednesday Mar. 24, 2021)
  Intel is going to dive headlong into the foundry business, starting with a $20 billion investment in not one but two fabs in Arizona. New CEO Pat Gelsinger said the company is establishing the contract manufacturing endeavor as a standalone business called Intel Foundry Services.
  
  
• (Re)Shoring Up Semiconductor Manufacturing (Tuesday Mar. 23, 2021)
  Sometimes history can be difficult to decipher. But the reasons why manufacturing moved out of the United States are blatantly obvious — cheap labor and reduced regulation.
  
  
• Global Semiconductor Materials Market Sets New High With 5% Expansion in 2020, SEMI Reports (Monday Mar. 22, 2021)
  The global semiconductor materials market grew 4.9% in 2020 to $55.3 billion in revenue, surpassing the previous market high of $52.9 billion set in 2018, SEMI, the global industry association representing the electronics manufacturing and design supply chain, reported today in its Materials Market Data Subscription (MMDS).
  
  
• Chip Makers Must Learn New Ways to Play "D" (Monday Mar. 22, 2021)
  We used to think of planar transistors in the glory days of classical Dennard scaling in two-dimensional terms. Material specifications were simplified into things like sheet resistance in ohms per square.
  
  
• Global Fab Equipment Spending Poised to Log Three Straight Years of Record Highs, SEMI Reports (Thursday Mar. 18, 2021)
  Fueled by surging pandemic-inspired demand for electronics devices, the global semiconductor industry is on track to register a rare three consecutive years of record highs in fab equipment spending with a 16% increase in 2020 followed by forecast gains of 15.5% this year and 12% in 2022
  
  
• More than Chiplets | Facebook Enters the Fray (Thursday Mar. 18, 2021)
  Our chiplet discussion left off with the historical perspective that “this isn’t new.” Heterogenous integration, system-in-package (SiP) and the the related package level integrations have all been done before.
  
  
• Samsung and TSMC Seeking to Spend Their Way to Worldwide Domination of Advanced IC Technology (Wednesday Mar. 17, 2021)
  Keeping up with producing leading-edge IC technology has become increasingly expensive over the past 25 years. The investment required to implement the most advanced process technologies for logic devices has now driven out all but three companies—Samsung, TSMC, and Intel—from the leading edge portion of the market.
  
  
• IC Insights Raises Its 2021 IC Market Forecast from 12% to 19% Growth (Wednesday Mar. 10, 2021)
  IC Insights believes that the 1Q21/4Q20 IC market will show a 2% increase. If this forecast comes to fruition, it would be the first 1Q/4Q sequential IC market increase since a 1% growth rate was registered 10 years ago in 1Q11.