CCID Consulting, a research, consulting, and IT provider in China, recently released its analysis on China’s semiconductor industry. The report evaluates the 2007 sales figures for China’s IC market, the RFID market, mobile device market, as well as many other technologies using semiconductors. The report also has predictions for how well each area will do in next year, 2008.

CCID Consulting Analyzes China’s Semiconductor Industry

BEIJING, Dec. 27–CCID Consulting, China’s leading research, consulting and IT outsourcing service provider, and the first Chinese consulting firm listed in Hong Kong (Hong Kong Stock Exchange: HK08235), recently released its analysis on China’s semiconductor industry.

Sales revenue of China’s IC market to reach 596.63 billion Yuan in 2007

At the beginning of 2007, institutions and organizations in the IC industry were comparatively optimistic on the semiconductor market in 2007. It was forecasted that the growth rate of the global IC market would be 5% to 10%. However, as the price of DRAM fell significantly and the analogue IC market was stagnant in 2007, the growth rate of the global IC market in 2007 will be lower than 5% judging from the current condition. As for China’s IC market, the development of the market in 2007 will be slower than that in 2006. The immediate cause is the drop of the growth rate of downstream whole machine output. In 2007, the output growth rates of such electronics products as mobile phones, LCD TVs and LCD displays in China were lower than that of 2006.

For the figure, “Sales Revenue and Growth Rate of China’s IC Market, 2003- 2007”, please refer to http://www.ccidconsulting.com/upload/12544.jpg . (Source: CCID Consulting, Dec. 2007)

In 2008, the global IC market is expected to revive, and the share of China’s IC market is expected to be over 20%. In the future, the growth of China’s market will be driven by the structural upgrade of various kinds of electronics products, 3G applications as well as the stimulation on consumption by Olympic Games and the World Expo.

China’s RFID Market maintained high-speed growth in 2007

Driven by government-led projects, China’s RFID market kept a high-speed growth in 2007, led by developments in identification systems. The continuous and concentrated release of the second generation of ID cards was still the largest market for RFID application. Moreover, the government began to actively carry out pilot works in postal services, customs, hazardous goods management, pharmaceutical management and logistics. Government projects are still dominating the whole RFID market in China, which will continue within a short period of time. In 2007, breakthroughs were made in the development of Ultra-High Frequency (UHF) RFID standard in China. The Ministry of Information Industry of PRC standardized the trial frequency of China’s UHF RFID technology at 840-845MHz and 920-925 MHz, laying a foundation for the promotion of UHF RFID in the future.

In 2008, RFID will be used extensively in Olympic e-tickets and Olympic foods in addition to applications of identification systems. It can be predicted that the application of RFID in the Olympic Games will become one of the most important impetuses in the large-scale applications in China.

Sales volume of China’s smart card market to reach 1.1 billion in 2007

In 2007, driven by the rapid development of mobile communication cards, the total sales volume of smart cards will reach 1.1 billion. Mobile communication cards contribute to the major share, with the total sales volume in 2007 over 600 million, driven mainly by breakthroughs that increase cards storage capacity from 32KB to 64KB this year. On the other hand, “multipurpose cards” are becoming the important development direction of smart cards in the non-telecom application field. In 2007, the Ministry of Construction of PRC released and enforced the Establishment of Undertaking IC Card Application Technology standard. Developments in the work of the “all-in-one card” has quickened, laying the foundation in applying the “multipurpose card” to traffic cards, electricity cards, gas cards, water cards and other public service cards. In the aspect of campus card, with the building of unified campus IT application platforms, all-in-one cards with access control, payment and even financial service functions will gradually become the mainstream.

For more on “Size of China’s Smart Card Market, 2003-2007”, please refer to http://www.ccidconsulting.com/upload/12545.jpg . (Source: CCID Consulting, Dec. 2007)

Sales revenue of China’s power device market to reach 82.17 billion Yuan

With the constant increases of the output of whole-machines and the application proportion of power device in whole-machine products, China’s power device market will maintain a high-speed growth momentum from 2007 to 2011. However, with the expansion of the market base number, the growth rate will drop year after year.

For the figure, “Size of China’s Power Device Market, 2003-2007”, please refer to http://www.ccidconsulting.com/upload/12546.jpg. (Source: CCID Consulting, Dec. 2007)

In the following years, the development speed of China’s power supply management chip market will still be higher than that of the global market. But it will be an inevitable trend for the development speed of China’s power supply management chip market to eventually slow down to that of the global market. In systems requiring higher controllability and complexity, digital power supply products will enjoy greater advantage than analogue power products.

In the power discrete device market, as IGBT products are mainly applied in high voltage products, the market size of it is smaller than that of MOSFET. Driven by the consumer market and the computer market with requirements on high output current and high performance, the low voltage MOSFET market will maintain a rather high growth rate in the future. For high voltage MOSFET, the high-energy efficiency requirements of power supply will be the major factor affecting the development of these products in the future.

MTK TurnKey mode won victory and Infineon single-chip solution swept China

MTK has become the largest mobile phone baseband chip supplier among mobile phone manufacturers in China. MTK products integrate various applications including that of cameras, MP3s, MP4s and many more, thus reducing the cost of mobile phone platforms. More importantly, its product scheme lowers the R&D threshold of manufacturers and shortens the R&D cycle. Besides, there are many mobile phone design houses in China, enabling mobile phone manufacturers with poorer technical foundation to reach the right path at a faster pace. As opposed to MTK, the success of Infineon benefited from its low cost single-chip solution. In 2006, there were only 10 odd mobile phone manufacturers in China that adopted Infineon solution, while this figure increased to 40 in 2007. The advantage of Infineon is that its products can realize the complete family of mobile phone functions through collocating with different application processors and coprocessors, ranging from low cost mobile phones, feature phones, super feature phones, quasi-smart phones to smart phones. Therefore, MTK and Infineon develop their products in different directions, that while the former concentrates on system integration, the later focuses on simplicity. From the aspect of future development, MTK has a fatal shortcoming: its products are too consubstantial and identical. With the maturation of the mobile phone market, products with differentiated functionalities will be more competitive.

For the figure, “Structure of Domestic Mobile Phone Enterprises’ Baseband Chip Demands in 2007(E)”, please refer to http://www.ccidconsulting.com/upload/12547.jpg . (Source: CCID Consulting)

Sales revenue of China’s automobile electronic market to reach 115.74 billion Yuan in 2007

In 2007, China’s automobile industry maintained a high-speed growth momentum with the growth rate of automobile output over 20%. The dominant position of sedan in the automobile industry is becoming increasingly obvious. Driven by the powerful development of the automobile industry, China’s automobile electronic market maintained a rather high growth rate of 33.4% in 2007, which is higher than that of automobile output. The power control system upgraded steadily, and the chassis control system was diversified. Car-related lifestyle electronics products, such as CD+MP3, became increasingly popular. The preinstalled onboard GPS market increased steadily.

For the figure, “Scales and Growth Rate of China’s Automobile Electronic Market, 2003-2007”, please refer to http://www.ccidconsulting.com/upload/12548.jpg . (Source: CCID Consulting, Dec. 2007)

Sales revenue of China’s MCU market to reach 19.51 billion Yuan in 2007

As one of the most important production bases in the world, China’s electronic product manufacturing industry kept growing quantitatively in 2007. Besides, its structure in quality was upgrading constantly. Therefore, this drives the constant increase of the market demand on MCU. In 2007, China’s MCU market maintained a rather high speed of growth with a year-on-year increase of 17.1%. The market scale is over $2.5 billion. In the following years, this market will maintain the trend of high-speed growth.

For the figure, “Sales Revenue and Growth Rate of China’s MCU Market, 2003-2007”, please refer to http://www.ccidconsulting.com/upload/12549.jpg . (Source: CCID Consulting, Dec. 2007)

The market trends in the future are as follows: the market performances of products with different bits will be quite different; the growth of 4-bit products will slow down; the growth rates of 16-bit and 32-bit products will be high; the price trend will polarize; the price of products for quasi- specific applications will continue to take the high-end path, and the price of mature general-purpose products will drop continuously; the boundary between MCUs with different bits will become increasingly obscure, at the same time, the progress of integration between MCU and other IC products will be faster; emerging applications will become the focus of leading enterprises. These applications include inverter air conditioners, automotive entertainment, body electronics, motor control, family security control, and portable medical electronics, etc.

About CCID Consulting

CCID Consulting Co., Ltd. (hereinafter known as “CCID Consulting”), the first Chinese consulting firm listed in the Growth Enterprise Market of the Stock Exchange (GEM) of Hong Kong (stock code: HK08235), is directly affiliated to the China Center for Information Industry Development (hereinafter known as “CCID Group”). Headquartered in Beijing, CCID Consulting has set up branch offices in Shanghai, Guangzhou, Shenzhen, and Harbin, with over 300 professional consultants and industry experts. The company’s business covers over 200 large and medium-sized cities in China. Apart from home market development, CCID Consulting establishes international cooperation links across the United States, the Asia-Pacific region and Europe with agents in the U.S., Japan, South Korea, Australia, Singapore, Italy and Russia, with the aim of going global.

Based on four major competitive areas: powerful data channels, industrial resources, intense knowledge and a deep understanding of information technology, CCID Consulting provides customers with consulting, research and IT outsourcing services covering strategic planning, IT applications, marketing strategies, human resources and information technology outsourcing. Customers range from industrial IT users, telecommunications companies, energy companies, finance companies, and automobile companies, to government departments at all levels and diversified industrial parks. CCID Consulting commits itself to be the number 1 consultant in strategic consulting, the number 1 brand for strategic consultancy, the number 1 advisor for enterprise management and the number 1 consultant for government decision-making.