China is the Largest Semiconductor Market, as Global Chip Sales Hit Record High

A new report has revealed that the global chip sales had hit a record high last year. The market saw great performance in 2021, with China being the largest individual semiconductor market in the world.

The news arrives from SIA (Semiconductor Industry Association) earlier this week (Via LiveMint). As per the report, the chip sales across the globe reached 555.9 billion US Dollars last year. This marks a sizeable rise of 26.2 percent year on year. It further adds that the the semiconductor industry is projected to see another 8.8 percent growth this year as well as chipmakers continue to build up production capacity to meet the rising demand. China lead the market with a total sales of a whopping 192.5 billion US Dollars in 2021, marking an increase of 27.1 percent year on year.

SIA CEO John Neuffer stated that “It’s still really trending very strongly towards increased demand. We’re just not going to get this kind of slingshot effect that we had in the pandemic.” In other words, the industry may not maintain its explosive growth but will still see a steady rise year on year in 2022. Back in 2020, semiconductor sales were up by just 6.8 percent over the previous, but just a year later in 2021, chip sales crossed 1 trillion for the first time since 2018.

Notably, major chipmakers like TSMC (Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Company), Samsung, and Intel have announced billions of dollars in investments to expand chip production through new facilities. Neuffer added that “We think in the foreseeable future that there’s going to be plenty of demand for us to do very, very aggressive plant construction.”