Acres of silicon wafers still fail to meet demand

CHIP ANALYST Future Horizon produced figures that show that despite the existence of 45 fab lines using 300mm silicon wafers there's still a problem meeting worldwide semiconductor demand.

In a monthly update to its clients, principal analyst Malcolm Penn said these fabs have an average capacity of 24,000 wafters a month. But, he said, that number "needs to increase by 25 per cent over the next year just to keep pace with the underlying increase in demand."

He said capacity needs to increase at an average of 10 per cent a year. The total net utilisation wafer fab capacity in Q3 at 200mm was 1,608,000 ws/w and a 10 per cent increase in demand requires additional net capacity.

Future Horizons points out that the problem with capacity is it takes a long time to change. Capital expenditure today means units three quarters later, with an additional two quarters for investment to come on line, and another quarter for wafer fab process cycle time.

While foundries help to smooth peak and troughs, poor Q4 performance is a direct sign of reduced first quarter demand, said Penn. µ

L'INQ
Future Horizons