The World Semiconductor Trade Statistics (Wsts) has released its new semiconductor market forecast. Wsts anticipates the global market to show a moderate growth of 3.4% up to US$347 billion in 2015, driven by all major product categories. All major product categories are forecasted to have positive growth rates. The highest growth rates are expected for the optoelectronics (8.3%) and analog (5.6%) category. By geography, not all regions will grow from 2014. Europe and Japan will show a decline in 2015 at the US$ based forecast, which is mainly based on the current FX effect between Euro/USD and Yen/USD. The semiconductor market growth in 2015 will be largely driven by smartphones and automotive. Worldwide semiconductor market is expected to grow further moderately in both 2016 and 2017. All major product categories and regions are forecasted to grow positively in each year, with the assumption of stable macro economy throughout the forecast period. Worldwide market is forecasted to be up 3.4% to US$359 billion in 2016. For 2017, the market is forecasted to be US$370 billion, up by 3%. By end application, automotive and wireless communications are projected to grow stronger than the total market, whereas consumer and computer are assumed to rermain almost flat. By region, a positive growth rate is projected for all regions in 2016 and 2017. Asia-Pacific continues to show growth rates above the worldwide average. Asia-Pacific is still the fastest growing region and is expected to reach US$216 billion in 2016, which is a share of 60% of the total semiconductor market.
