Fab utilization rising steadily, report says
Semiconductor Business News
May 17, 2002 (5:47 p.m. EST)
SAN JOSE -- VLSI Research Inc. today predicted that worldwide wafer fab capacity utilization rates will reach 82.4% in May, up from 80.2% in April. The industry's wafer-processing frontend capacity utilization rate hit bottom at 69% in December for the worldwide chip industry. In February, the rate was at 71.4%, said VLSI Research.
"The 80% line is historically important because this is when most chip makers start to upgrade existing facilities fairly aggressively," said the research firm.
The forecast comes one day after a new book-to-bill report for North American-based suppliers showed a reading of 1.20 in April, based on data collected by the Semiconductor Equipment and Materials International (SEMI) trade group. The new SEMI Express Report book-to-bill was at its highest point since the index stood at 1.27 in June 2000 because of a 17% increase in worldwide billings at North American suppliers (see May 16 story).
VLSI Research's Industry Pulse Pro report today reported that the book-to-bill ratio for the entire chip equipment industry reached a preliminary reading of 1.15 in April, up from 0.99 in March. The research firm said the worldwide book-to-bill reading in April was the highest since May 2000. A ratio of 1.15 means suppliers were receiving $115 worth of new orders for $100 of products billed to customers.
The San Jose research firm also said semiconductor markets showed strong growth in April. Based on a three-month average, semiconductor bookings were at $12.9 billion in April, while billings stood at $9.7 billion worldwide, according to VLSI Research. That combination creates a semiconductor book-to-bill of 1.33, which is the highest ratio in the last 24 months.
VLSI Research is predicting that the semiconductor book-to-bill will drop to 1.14 in the seasonally weak month of May, with bookings at $11.4 billion and sales at about $10 billion. |
