This Year's Semiconductor Market's Top Star is 'NAND Flash'

▲Samsung Electronics 4th generation V-NAND flash product. (Provided by Samsung Electronics)

[Asia Economy Reporter Changhwan Lee] This year, the global semiconductor market is expected to see a slight increase compared to the previous year, with NAND flash projected to record the largest growth. It is analyzed that NAND flash will be the biggest beneficiary of the increased untact (contactless) demand due to the spread of the novel coronavirus disease (COVID-19).

According to market research firm IC Insights on the 9th, the global semiconductor market is expected to grow by about 3% this year compared to the previous year. This is an improvement from the -15% recorded last year.

Despite the economic downturn caused by the spread of COVID-19 this year, the semiconductor market grew because demand for certain items increased significantly due to the spread of untact culture.

In particular, the NAND flash market, a type of memory semiconductor, is expected to grow sharply by 27% compared to the previous year.

Due to the spread of COVID-19 this year, demand for servers surged because of increased remote work, video conferencing, and internet usage, leading to a significant increase in sales of solid-state drives (SSD), which are auxiliary storage devices used in servers. SSDs are data storage devices made from NAND flash and are used in servers, PCs, and gaming consoles.

Source: IC Insights

According to market research firm Omdia, the global SSD market size, which was $23.1 billion last year, is expected to increase by about 41% to $32.6 billion this year.

The DRAM market, which leads the memory semiconductor market along with NAND flash, is expected to grow by about 3% this year. DRAM is also interpreted to have been influenced by increased demand related to untact due to COVID-19.

IC Insights expects global DRAM shipments to increase by 7.5% from the previous year to 18.56 billion units this year.

While memory semiconductors performed well, most non-memory semiconductors are expected to contract this year. Among the 33 semiconductor items surveyed by IC Insights, only eight items, including NAND and DRAM, are expected to grow this year, while the remaining 25 items are forecasted to decline. DSP (digital signal processors) are expected to record the largest decline at -19%, and SRAM (static random-access memory) is also expected to decrease by 18% compared to the previous year.

IC Insights explained, "This year, as consumers and companies delayed purchases, the expected sales scale of most semiconductor sectors has been reduced."

This content was produced with the assistance of AI translation services.