SEMI, a company representing chipmakers and producers of semiconductor manufacturing instruments, printed this week that gross sales of wafer processing tools has surged to an all-time file of $71.19 billion for 2020. In the lead-up to the present chip crunch, tools gross sales to South Korea and China noticeably spiked, with fabs within the former shopping for 61% extra gear than in 2019, whereas China has risen to turn into the most important fab instrument buyer of the entire nations.
Overall, gross sales of fab tools surged 19% from $59.75 billion in 2019 to $71.19 billion in 2020, in keeping with SEMI. The substantial improve was pushed by a number of components. First and foremost, the world now consumes extra chips than ever, and that consumption will solely develop over time. Secondly, the competitors between TSMC and Samsung Semiconductor (which has Foundry and Memory divisions) is escalating and each firms are spending extra money on semiconductor tools. Thirdly, next-generation lithography tools (each DUV and EUV) is getting dearer, so are different instruments utilized in clear rooms. And lastly, China is intensifying its home semiconductor efforts amid the commerce struggle with the U.S.
| Annual Billings by Region in $U.S. Billions with Year-Over-Year Change Rates | ||||||
| Region | 2020 | 2019 | Change | |||
| China | 18.72 | 13.45 | 39% | |||
| Taiwan | 17.15 | 17.12 | 0.2% | |||
| South Korea | 16.08 | 9.97 | 61% | |||
| Japan | 7.58 | 6.27 | 21% | |||
| North America | 6.53 | 8.15 | -20% | |||
| Europe | 2.64 | 2.28 | 16% | |||
| ROW | 2.48 | 2.52 | -1% | |||
| Total | 71.19 | 59.75 | 19% | |||
Chinese firms elevated their spending on wafer processing tools by 39% year-over-year in 2020 to $18.72 billion, an all-time file for the nation. Various firms, each home and overseas, are ramping up manufacturing of logic and reminiscence chips in China, so the surge was one thing anticipated.
Taiwanese producers purchased semiconductor instruments value $17.15 billion final yr, which was flat with 2019. Now that UMC (which is the world’s third largest contract maker of chips) is targeted on specialty and mature processes, it not has to purchase modern tools. By distinction, TSMC’s purchases of recent instruments offset declines at UMC, however on the nation stage shipments of semi instruments had been flat year-over-year. Meanwhile, that is going to vary in 2021 as TSMC plans to radically improve its spending on new fabs as much as $28 billion in 2020 and intends to take a position $100 billion in new crops and R&D over the subsequent three years.
South Korean firms elevated their annual spending on semiconductor tools to $16.08 billion final yr, a whopping 61% year-over-year bounce. Samsung Semiconductor, which has foundry providers for logic, DRAM, and NAND flash reminiscence, has been setting data with its CapEx budgets within the latest years. Its rival SK Hynix has additionally been growing procurement of wafer processing tools. As a outcome, in 2020 South Korean firms spent about the identical amount of cash on fab instruments as Japan, North America, and Europe mixed.
And although Japan is not a microelectronics mecca, however Japanese firms nonetheless spent $7.58 billion on fab instruments final yr, up 21% from 2019. A big share of that expenditure doubtless belongs to Kioxia and Western Digital that continuously purchase new tools for his or her 3D NAND operations, and there are a variety of different firms in Japan that produce extra specialised semiconductors.
Meanwhile, instrument purchases by American fabs truly dropped by 20% versus the earlier yr, sinking to $6.53 billion for 2020. The US continues to be the runaway chief for chip design, so the drop serves to widen the hole between how a lot is designed within the nation versus how little is fabbed there. Overall it appears like…
