End-Use Products that Drove Semiconductor Sales in 2016

by Semiconductor Industry Association

Communications and PCs/computers remained the top semiconductor markets by end use in 2016. At the same time, automotive and industrial end markets continued their strong growth path. This is according to the recently released World Semiconductor Trade Statistics (WSTS) 2016 Semiconductor End-Use Report, which details sales by end use and regional end market for a wide variety of semiconductor products. The figure below shows the major semiconductor end applications’ share of total semiconductor sales for 2016.

2016 marked the third year in a row that communications (31.5 percent of total sales) represented the largest end-use application for semiconductors. As in 2015, however, its share of total semiconductor sales in 2016 decreased by 2.6 percent. As in 2015, communications and PC/computer (29.5 percent) were the two largest end-use categories by far in 2016, combining for 61 percent of the value of all semiconductors sold in 2016. The share of these two categories, however, declined from 63.8 percent in 2015, mainly due to the decrease in the communications share of the total.

While the other three major end-use categories—consumer (13.5 percent), industrial (12.9 percent), and automotive (11.6 percent)—grew in terms of share, the industrial and automotive categories experienced the most notable increases. This growth continues the decades-long trend of these two end markets steadily growing as a demand driver for semiconductors.

The 2016 Semiconductor End-Use Report provides end-use data by major end application for all the major semiconductor product sub-segments as well as by major geographic regions, including China, the Americas, Japan, and the EU. Furthermore, the survey presents tables with end-use shares by percentage and by total sales in dollars. With almost 2,000 data points in the entire report, the 2016 Semiconductor End-Use Report is a valuable resource for anyone interested in understanding semiconductor market trends by end use.

The report is available for purchase on the SIA website. For more information about the 2016 End-Use Report, please contact me directly at fyinug@semiconductors.org.