According to market research firm Gartner, Samsung Electronics has become the world's largest semiconductor supplier due to the boom in the memory chip market in the past two years, but its position is likely to fall to second place in 2019.
Up to 88% of Samsung Electronics’ revenue comes from memory chip sales. Andrew Norwood, vice president of research at Gartner, said, "The leading position of Samsung Electronics is actually based on the unstable memory chip business. In 2019, due to the instability of the memory chip market, its position as the world's largest semiconductor supplier will be replaced by Intel. ”
According to Gartner, global semiconductor revenues in 2018 totaled $474.6 billion, an increase of 12.5% from 2017. In 2018, global semiconductor revenue increased year-on-year, a decrease of 21.9% from the year-on-year growth in 2017.
“Despite the slowdown in growth, storage chips are still the largest segment of the semiconductor market, with revenues accounting for 34.3%,” Norwood said. “This is mainly driven by rising DRAM prices, as the average selling price of DRAM (ASP) has been rising in 2018. However, due to oversupply, the average selling price of DRAM began to fall in the fourth quarter of 2018, and this trend will continue into the second half of 2019."
