United Microelectronics Co (UMC, 聯電) is expected to overtake GlobalFoundries Inc as the world’s third-largest foundry this quarter, as strong demand for display driver and power management chips is estimated to help drive its revenue up 13 percent, market researcher TrendForce Corp (集邦科技) said yesterday.
UMC would see its revenue expand to US$1.57 billion this quarter from a year earlier, with a global market share of 6.9 percent, compared with GlobalFoundries’ estimated revenue of US$1.49 billion, with a market share of 6.6 percent, the Taipei-based researcher said.
TrendForce attributed the growth to rising customer orders for display driver, power management and Internet of Things chips.
Photo: David Chang, EPA-EFE
That would boost the utilization rate at UMC’s 8-inch factories and its chip prices, as well as its shipments of 28-nanometer chips, TrendForce said.
GlobalFoundries is streamlining its factory operations, after selling an 8-inch fab in Singapore to Taiwan’s Vanguard International Semiconductor Corp (世界先進) at the end of last year for US$236 million.
Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (台積電) is expected to retain its top position, with revenue forecast to surge 21 percent year-on-year to US$12.55 billion this quarter and a market share of 55.6 percent.
Samsung Electronics Co would rank fourth, with revenue likely to expand 16.4 percent to US$3.72 billion and a 16.4 percent market share, TrendForce said.
Semiconductor Manufacturing International Corp (SMIC, 中芯國際), the biggest chipmaker in China, would rank fifth, with a market share of 4.3 percent, as its revenue is predicted to grow 15 percent to US$963 million this quarter, benefiting from rising demand for radio frequency and power management chips, TrendForce said.
However, SMIC’s revenue this quarter would decline 11 percent quarter-on-quarter, as it was forced to stop shipping chips to HiSilicon Technologies Co (海思), the chip designing arm of Huawei Technologies Co (華為), from Sept. 14.
SMIC was also added to a US blacklist due to its ties with the Chinese military.
Tower Semiconductor Ltd, which sells chips under the Tower Jazz brand, seized the sixth spot with revenue of US$340 million, up 11 percent from a year earlier. The Israeli company is expected to have a market share of 1.5 percent this quarter.
Taiwan’s Powerchip Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (力積電) and Vanguard ranked seventh and eighth, with revenue growing 28 percent and 24 percent to US$312 million and US$297 million respectively this quarter, TrendForce said.
The two firms would have market shares of 1.4 percent and 1.3 percent respectively, it said.
DAMAGE REPORT: Global central banks are assessing war-driven inflation risks as the law of unintended consequences careens around the world, spiking oil prices Central banks from Washington to London and from Jakarta to Taipei are about to make their first assessments of economic damage after more than two weeks of conflict between the US and Iran. Decisions this week encompassing every member of the G7 and eight of the world’s 10 most-traded currency jurisdictions are likely to confirm to investors that the specter of a new inflation shock is already worrying enough to prompt heightened caution. The US Federal Reserve is widely expected to do exactly what everyone anticipated weeks ahead of its March 17-18 policy gathering: hold rates steady. The narrative surrounding that
Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co’s (TSMC, 台積電) share of the global foundry market rose to almost 70 percent last year amid booming demand for artificial intelligence (AI), market information advisory firm TrendForce Corp (集邦科技) said on Thursday. The contract chipmaker posted US$122.54 billion in revenue, up 36.1 percent from a year earlier, accounting for 69.9 percent of the global market, TrendForce said. Its share was up from 64.4 percent in 2024, it said. TSMC’s closest rival, Samsung Electronics, was a distant second, posting US$12.63 billion in sales, down 3.9 percent from a year earlier, for a 7.2 percent share of the global market. In the
At a massive shipyard in North Vancouver, Canadian workers grind metal beams for a powerful new icebreaker crucial to cementing the country’s presence in the increasingly contested arctic. Icebreakers are specialized, expensive vessels able to navigate in the frozen far north. And “this is the crown jewel,” said Eddie Schehr, vice president of production at the Seaspan shipyard. For Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney, who heads to Norway next Friday to observe arctic defense drills involving troops from 14 NATO states, Canada’s extreme north has emerged as a strategic priority. “Canada is and forever will be an Arctic nation,” he said ahead of
Chinese entrepreneur Frank Gao used to spend long hours running his social media accounts but now outsources the chore to artificial intelligence (AI) agent tool OpenClaw, which is taking China by storm despite official warnings over cybersecurity. OpenClaw, created in November by an Austrian coder, differs from bots such as ChatGPT because it can execute real-life tasks such as sending e-mails, organizing files or even booking flight tickets. “Since January, I’ve spent hours on the lobster every day,” Gao said in an interview, referring to OpenClaw’s red crustacean mascot. “We’re family.” After downloading OpenClaw, users connect it to artificial intelligence models of their
RSS