2009 "Worst for 20 Years", says DMASS

2009 will turn out to be one of the worst years in European semiconductor distribution of the last 20 years, according to DMASS (Distributors' and Manufacturers' Association of Semiconductor Specialists).

The first nine reporting months saw a decline of over 27 per cent against the same period of 2008. The glimmer of good news is that the steep decline of the first half has narrowed down over the last quarter. Q3/2009 ended with sales of 926m euro, a decline of 23.4 per cent versus Q3/2008. Hopes are high that the market will further recover and 2009 will close with a decline of  between 20 and 25 per cent. 

 

Georg Steinberger, chairman of DMASS, commented: “It seems that the dramatic hit the entire industry has taken since October last year, when the finance crisis swapped over into the industry, is wearing off and that the electronics market is on the way to recovery. Currently, we see a steep increase of bookings and in some cases delivery problems, both of which will add to the recovery. For 2009, we will still end up with a decrease of over 20%. And going forward, the big question is: Do we see a real recovery or a modest inventory correction that will ease out over the first half of 2010?”

 

There were no real winners in the European regions. The biggest region, Germany, declined in Q3 by 24.9 per cent to 315m euro compared to Q3/2008. Italywent down 27.8 per cent to 91m euro, the UK  was down 22.8 per cent to 86m Euro and France by 22 per cent to 73m euro. Nordic and Eastern Europe fell at the same rate, by 26.2%. Countries performing above average were Benelux at  minus 10.2 per cent, Austria down by 11.5% and Iberia off 14.3 per cent.

 

"The crisis may have erased many differences that have existed between the regions, specifically with regards to Eastern Europe," Steinberger observed. "The European electronics industry has arrived at the bottom, hopefully, everywhere and it is time to see how Europe can strengthen its production base again. From a sustainability perspective, the cheap production tourism around the world does not make much sense and that could drive a European electronics renaissance.”

 

In terms of major product groups, the only group in the single-digit per cent range of decline was memory down 6.5 per cent. Of the two biggest groups analogue slumped 20.7 per cent compared to Q3/2008 and MOS micro plummeted 27.7 per cent mainly driven by the steep fall of MPU revenues. Significantly better than average were DRAMs, RF discretes, higher-end microcontrollers and advanced analogue products.

 

Said Steinberger: “With bookings currently exceeding billings by far and lead times increasing, we can already hope to see growth again in some product areas during Q4, but very pointedly and not at a broad level.”

 

Note: DMASS only measures industrial sales of semiconductors, excluding the PC channel