DALLAS -- Texas Instruments Inc. here retained its No. 1 ranking in the analog semiconductor market for the third year in a row, according to Dataquest, a San Jose market researcher. The Dallas chip maker held onto its position in 1999 with a 10.7% share of the $26.2 billion analog market, Dataquest said. TI gained 23.3% in analog revenue over 1998. Overall, the analog market grew 18.8% in 1999.
TI also maintained its top position in the interface market while claiming the No.1 position in power management. The Dataquest rankings are based on 1999 company revenue.
According to Dataquest, TI maintained its No. 1 position for two reasons: its strength in traditional categories such as power management and its ability to position analog technology and software expertise to target new application-specific markets.
While TI's digital signal processors (DSP) get much of the attention, Dataquest noted that analog has become an integral part of the Internet and multimedia era. "Of all the semiconductor components, analog is the category to watch," said Mary Ann Olsson, who prepared the Dataquest Alert on analog.
In fact, analog and mixed-signal ICs have emerged as indispensable to many of the high-growth DSP applications, including digital phones, which would be slower, less secure or not possible at all without analog chips.
"We are well positioned to continue our leadership in this high-growth market," said Del Whitaker, senior vice president for analog and logic products, Texas Instruments. "Our long-term investments, leading-edge technology and growing portfolio in catalog and application-specific products, combined with our dedication to customer support and services, enable us toprovide the analog products that our customers need."
TI wrested the No. 1 spot from STMicroelectronics (see story from April 1998 online magazine). But ST Micro kept pace with TI, gaining 22.2% in analog revenue in 1999, and moving up to second place with an 8.6% market share. "ST really grew in the disk drive arena because of its acquisition of Adaptec," Olsson said.
Philips Semiconductors slipped from second to third place in analog in 1999, holding 6.9% of the market. Infineon Technologies AG and National Semiconductor Corp. rounded out the top five, according to Dataquest. Infineon moved up a notch to No. 4, while National displaced Analog Devices for No. 5. Infineon's revenue growth outpaced TI's, at 27%. Olsson noted telecom and automotive applications "really took a big jump" in 1999, and Infineon especially benefited there, she said.
The analog market is somewhat in upheaval because the core technology is being pushed by more application-specific products, according to Olsson. Despite the industry downturn, analog industry revenues shot up due to demand from consumer and communications markets. And more than a dozen startups have entered the analog arena, she said, and several smaller competitors have grown their revenues and market share faster than TI and the other leaders.
"The next 18 months should be an exciting period for all players in this oft-touted 'mature product' arena," Olsson said.
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