IC Insights: Total semiconductor sales to grow 11% this year to a record $680.7 billion

Against the backdrop of inflation, soaring energy costs, ongoing supply chain failures, and the Russian-Ukrainian conflict, IC Insights still expects total semiconductor sales to grow 11 percent this year — the same growth rate as a year earlier. And hit a record $680.7 billion in sales this year.

IC Insights’ latest “MacLean Report” has raised and lowered sales growth forecasts for several major semiconductor product categories this year (see chart below). These changes offset each other, keeping the overall semiconductor market growth at 11% in 2022. The report believes that the downward pressure on the economy poses a challenge to global growth and the situation is grim.

The report update for the second quarter of this year raised the forecast for micro component IC sales from 7% at the beginning of the year to 11% in 2022. This growth was driven by the embedded MPU category (now up 12%, up from 9% previously) and cellular micro-application processors (up 22%, well above the 10% forecast in January).

Report’s overall forecast for total IC sales growth in 2022 remains unchanged, with 11% growth expected this year to a record $567.1 billion. The report also believes that forecasts for analog ICs (up 12%) and logic ICs (up 11%) remain unchanged.

The report also lowered its total sales forecast for this year’s non-IC semiconductor market categories – optoelectronics, sensors and actuators, and discrete devices (OSDs), which account for about 17% of total global semiconductor revenue and are now expected to grow 9% to $113.6 billion , which is mainly due to the influence of CMOS image sensors and light devices (mainly light-emitting diodes – LEDs). However, weakness in optoelectronics was partially offset by strong growth in discrete semiconductors, mainly due to tight global supply and rising average selling prices (ASP), power transistors (now expected to grow 11% through 2022) and diodes (expected to grow 10%) %) with higher sales growth. The report’s strong 15% growth forecast for sensor/actuator semiconductors remains unchanged.