Japan Nov chip equipment orders up 7.1 pct yr/yr
Mon Dec 26, 2005 03:01 AM ET
TOKYO, Dec 26 (Reuters) - Orders for Japanese chip-making equipment rose for a third straight month in November as the global semiconductor market remained on a recovery track, an industry group said on Monday.
November orders came to 131 billion yen ($1.13 billion), up 7.1 percent from a year earlier, data from the Semiconductor Equipment Association of Japan (SEAJ) showed.
The pace of growth was slower than the 21.7 percent in September and October's 17.5 percent.
"It is quite clear that we are headed for recovery. I think we don't need to worry too much about monthly fluctuations in this volatile market," an SEAJ spokesman said.
The Semiconductor International Capacity Statistics group said last month that the utilisation rate of the world's microchip plants rose for the second quarter in a row in July-September, raising hopes for a pickup in chip makers' spending on manufacturing tools.
Japan, the world's largest market for semiconductor equipment, is home to such chip gear makers as Advantest Corp. (6857.T: Quote, Profile, Research) , the world's largest supplier of microchip-testing tools, which competes with the likes of Teradyne Inc. (TER.N: Quote, Profile, Research) and Agilent Technologies Inc. (A.N: Quote, Profile, Research) .
Japanese chip equipment makers also include Tokyo Electron Ltd. (8035.T: Quote, Profile, Research) , Canon Inc. (7751.T: Quote, Profile, Research) , Nikon Corp. (7731.T: Quote, Profile, Research) , Disco Corp. (6146.T: Quote, Profile, Research) and Yokogawa Electric Corp. (6841.T: Quote, Profile, Research) . ($1=116.42 Yen) |
