US-based companies held 13 of top 20 fabless spots in 2010

SCOTTSDALE, USA: Fig. 1 shows that US-based suppliers captured 9 of the top 10 places and 13 of the top 20 positions in the fabless IC supplier ranking for 2010. Combined, the top 20 fabless IC suppliers represented 77 percent of the $59.9 billion in fabless IC sales last year, down two points from 2009 but up two points from 2008.Source: IC Insights, USA.

It is worth noting that 2010 was the first year on record that total fabless IC company sales did not outperform total IC market growth (a 27 percent increase for fabless IC companies versus a total IC industry growth rate of 31 percent). As shown in Fig. 1, relatively poor performances by Qualcomm, MediaTek, Nvidia, LSI Corp., ST-Ericsson, Realtek, and Himax were to blame. In total, these seven "poor performers" increased their 2010 IC sales by only 8 percent, dismal results compared to total IC market growth of 31 percent.

Overall, 13 fabless IC companies had over $1 billion in IC sales in 2010. In contrast to the seven "poor performing" fabless companies mentioned above, IC Insights lists its "Magnificent Seven" fabless IC suppliers in Fig. 2. This sales-growth ranking includes fabless IC suppliers that had over $1 billion in sales in 2010 and outgrew the total IC industry increase of 31 percent.Source: IC Insights, USA.

These seven high-growth billion-dollar fabless companies, in total, registered a strong 47 percent increase in IC sales last year. Moreover, they accounted for 45 percent of the total increase in fabless IC sales in 2010 ($5.7 billion out of $12.6 billion)! With only seven fabless companies out of just over 100 major fabless IC suppliers (i.e., companies with greater than $10 million in sales) representing such a large share of last year's fabless IC sales increase, these companies are the prime targets for the IC foundries (e.g., TSMC, GlobalFoundries, UMC, Samsung, etc.).

IC Insights' April Update to The McClean Report (to be released later this month) is dedicated to IC company rankings and includes the top 50 semiconductor, IC, and fabless IC suppliers. Moreover, the top company rankings of MPU, MCU, foundry, flash memory, DRAM, analog, etc., suppliers are also provided in the April Update.

Source: IC Insights, USA.