What End-Use Applications Drove Semiconductor Sales in 2015?

by Semiconductor Industry Association

Communications (34.1 percent of total sales) and PCs/computers (29.7 percent) remained the top semiconductor markets by end-use in 2015, according to the recently released World Semiconductor Trade Statistics (WSTS) Semiconductor End-Use Report. The report breaks down sales by end-use and regional end-market for a wide variety of semiconductor products. The figure below shows the six major semiconductor end applications’ share of total semiconductor sales for 2015.

Last year marked the second year in a row that communications represented the largest end-use application for semiconductors. However, unlike over the past six years, it did not grow as a share of total semiconductor sales in 2015. As in 2014, the communications and PC/computer categories in 2015 were the two largest end-use categories by far, combining for nearly two-thirds of the value of all semiconductors sold in 2015. The share of these two categories declined slightly compared to 2014, mainly due to a 1 percent decrease in the PC/computer share of the total.

The only other end-use category that experienced a notable change in 2015 was industrial/government (12.8 percent), which increased by roughly 1 percent. The other major end-use categories – communications, consumer (13 percent), and automotive (10.3 percent) – remained roughly the same in 2015. Much of the stability in end use market share in 2015 was due to the overall size of the semiconductor market remaining flat in 2015.

The 2015 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 Asia-Pacific, 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 2015 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 2015 End-Use Report, please feel free to contact me directly at fyinug@semiconductors.org.