Research and Markets has added a report, Global and China Wafer Foundry Industry Report, 2010-2011, to its offering. The wafer foundry industries started progressing in 2010 and its output value has increased by 34%.
With a lot of manufacturers making substantial profits, several wafer foundries made capital investments for improving its facility. The increased demand for tablet PC and smart phone may not be advantageous for the growth of the total foundry industry except that Samsung and TSMC may be benefited. Nearly half of the global market share in the wafer foundry industry is held by TSMC with highly advanced technology and when compared to other manufacturers, about 95% of high-grade ICs are OEMed by TSMC, while other manufacturers remain as secondary or tertiary suppliers.
Wafer foundry is not just the OEM of common electronic goods, several IP library’s input is needed, high investment is required and superior talent is essential, hence a wafer foundry is much more complicated than fabricating an IC. Samsung is involved in manufacturing few types of IC, whereas SMIC, TSMC, and UMC are engaged purely in foundries.. By 2012, its revenue will still go down because Apple places its demands to TSMC.
Due to worldwide market for table PCs and smart phones, conventional and notebook PCs suffered a severe decline in market. OEMed high-end products such as 28nm and unique products such as high voltage or MEMS do not render prominent overcapacity. By 2013, other industries will feature overcapacity, resulting in obvious loss to most of the foundries.
Source: http://www.researchandmarkets.com