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Technology Stocks : Semi Equipment Analysis -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: StanX Long who wrote (8860)	3/4/2003 12:07:27 AM
From: StanX Long	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 95737

Global Chip Sales Fall in January from December Mon Mar 3, 5:46 PM ET story.news.yahoo.com By Duncan Martell SAN FRANCISCO (Reuters) - Global sales of semiconductors rose 22 percent to $12.2 billion in January from the year-ago month, as the chip industry rebounds from one of its worst-ever slumps, a trade group said on Monday. On a sequential basis, worldwide sales of microchips, found in everything from automobiles to computers to toasters, declined 2.4 percent in January from $12.5 billion in December 2002, according to figures released by trade group Semiconductor Industry Association (SIA). "For more than a decade now, with the exception of the boom year 2000, sales have been slightly lower in January than December because of the seasonality of the semiconductor industry," said George Scalise, president of the SIA, in a statement. Sales rose the most in Asia Pacific and Japan, by 33 and 34 percent, respectively, with Europe increasing 16 percent and the Americas by just 3 percent, the SIA said. The Asia-Pacific market now accounts for 36 percent of the global semiconductor market, the SIA said. Earlier on Monday, global trade group the World Semiconductor Trade Statistics released similar data. The SIA continues to forecast double-digit revenue growth for chip sales in 2003, on the order of 20 percent, paced by a recovery in spending on information technology, a fast-paced global wireless market and robust growth in Wi-Fi wireless networking technology and broadband networks using advanced chip technologies, Scalise said. TOO OPTIMISTIC? Some market research firms and financial analysts are forecasting a smaller increase in global chip sales this year than the SIA, however. Dan Niles, semiconductor and computer hardware analyst at Lehman Brothers, wrote in a note to clients on Monday that he believed the SIA forecast is likely too optimistic.