2012 Semiconductor Manufacturing Research Review

Report Highlights

This 2012 Semiconductor Manufacturing Review provides:

• An overview of the current market and an impartial analysis of prospects for future growth, with a focus on the raw materials used to produce thin films and nanofilms.
• Forecast of the global market for compound semiconductor–based components in value (dollar sales) and volume (shipment sales) terms.
• Focus on materials used for optical coating and opportunities for optical in the telecommunications, transportation, defense, photography, electronics and medical markets.
• Environmental and regulatory trends for thermal management.

FOREWORD

As electronic devices get smaller and smaller, and do more with less space, clean rooms have become cleaner, and what was once waste is now so valuable, retrieval procedures are used to identify and recover whatever is possible, from chip wafers.

The semiconductor fabrication business is divided into:

• Integrated device manufacturers (IDMs) such as chipmakers like Intel, Samsung and STMicroelectronics that design, manufacture and sell chips.
• Fabless manufacturers such as Qualcomm, NVIDIA and AMD that design and sell chips but outsource chip manufacturing to foundry companies.

This year was the first where an IDM pioneered a business deal with a gold supplier (Amara Mining, Cluff Gold at time of signing) to invest in exploration in return for a reducted spot market price.  Samsung uses more than a ton of gold each month in semiconductor manufacturing. This interconnectedness of the supply chain echoes concerns brought about by the earthquake and tsunami in Japan—the costs in this business are high, and instability for any reason must be mitigated.

Wireless applications continue to broaden product applications, particularly in the healthcare sector, where patient data is becoming a product unto itself.

This 2012 Semiconductor Manufacturing Review provides a glimpse into some of the market research reports we published this year.  In this Review, you will find excerpts from reports covering these key Semiconductor Manufacturing markets:

• Global Markets, Technologies and Materials for Thin and Ultrathin Films.
• Global Markets and Technologies for Compound Semiconductors.
• Optical Coatings: Technologies and Global Markets.
• The Market for Thermal Management Technologies.

We hope you find the 2012 Semiconductor Manufacturing Research Review informative, and we always welcome your comments and suggestions.

Regards,

Chris Spivey
Senior Editor
BCC Research