On July 7, the US semiconductor industry association (SIA) announced that in May 2021, global semiconductor industry sales were $43.6 billion, up 26.2% from $34.6 billion in May 2020 and 4.1% from April. Total sales in April 2021 were $41.9 billion.
JohnNeuffer, president and CEO of SIA, said global demand for semiconductors remained high in May as sales in all major regional markets increased year-on-year and month-on-month. The industry shipped more in May than in any other month in market history suggesting that semiconductor production has increased significantly to meet growing demand.
Regionally, sales increased year-on-year in Europe (31.2%), Asia Pacific / all other regions (30.9%), China (26.1%), the Americas (20.9%) and Japan (20.4%). Month-on-month growth was recorded in the Americas (5.9%), China (5.4%), Japan (3.1%), Asia Pacific / all other regions (2.6%) and Europe (1.1%).
JohnNeuffer pointed out that in the long run, due to the increasing demand for personal devices and chip computing devices, the semiconductor market will continue to grow in the next few years. In addition to personal devices and servers, semiconductor applications including AI, 5G and self-driving are also developing rapidly, so that the revenue of the semiconductor industry in 2021 is expected to grow by another 8.4% compared with the previous year.
In a growing environment, JohnNeuffer warned that without bold action by the US government, it would be better for other countries to take advantage of this rise to widen the gap with the US.
