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MediaTek ranks
No. 7 semiconductor supplier in 2021: Gartner
01/22/2022
Taipei, Jan. 22 (CNA) MediaTek Inc., a Taiwan-based smartphone chip designer,
was ranked the seventh largest semiconductor supplier in the world in 2021, up
one notch from a year earlier, according to American market information advisory
firm Gartner.
In a research note, Gartner said MediaTek posted US$17.45 billion in sales in 2021, up 58.8 percent from a year earlier. The Taiwanese tech firm has said the strong showing in sales largely reflected solid demand for smartphone and TV chips and chips used in Internet of Things applications.
The Taiwanese supplier took a 3.0 percent share in the global market in 2021, Gartner said.
MediaTek's sales growth beat the global average of 25.1 percent in 2021, when chip sales worldwide hit US$583.48 billion, according to Gartner.
Gartner's tallies did not include pure wafer foundry operators such as Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co. (TSMC), which commands a more than 50 percent share of the global market.
The 5G smartphone market "helped drive semiconductor revenue, with unit production more than doubling to reach 555 million in 2021, compared to 250 million in 2020," Andrew Norwood, research vice president at Gartner, said in the research note.
"U.S. sanctions imposed on Huawei resulted in other Chinese smartphone OEMs gaining share and fueling growth for 5G chipset vendors such as Qualcomm, MediaTek and Skyworks.
Meanwhile HiSilicon, Huawei's chip subsidiary, saw revenue decline from US$8.2 billion in 2020 to around US$1 billion in 2021," Norwood said.
A global chip shortage, in particular in the auto industry, resulted in a combination of strong demand as well as logistic and raw material price increases driving semiconductors' average selling price higher (ASP) and in turn pushed up overall revenue growth last year, Norwood added.
South Korea's Samsung Electronics Co. generated US$75.95 billion in sales in 2021, up 31.6 percent from a year earlier on the back of solid demand for memory chips, replacing U.S.-based Intel Corp. as the world's largest semiconductor supplier, Gartner said.
Falling to second place, Intel posted US$73.10 billion in sales in 2021, up only 0.5 percent from a year earlier, the lowest growth rate among the top 25 vendors, Gartner added.
Samsung took a 13.0 percent share of the global market in 2021, beating Intel's 12.5 percent, according to Gartner.
SK Hynix Inc., a South Korea-based dynamic random access memory (DRAM) chip supplier, came in third after posting US$36.33 billion in sales in 2021, up 40.5 percent, ahead of American DRAM maker Micron Technology Co. (US$28.45 billion in sales as No. 4, up 29.1 percent), and U.S.-based smartphone chip designer Qualcomm Inc. (US$26.86 billion as No. 5, up 52.3 percent), Gartner said.
Broadcom Inc. of the U.S. took sixth place after generating US$18.75 billion in 2021, up 19.0 percent from a year earlier, followed by No. 7 MediaTek, No.8 U.S.-based Texas Instruments Inc. (US$16.90 billion in sales, up 24.1 percent), No. 9 American Nvidia Corp. (US$16.26 billion, up 52.7 percent), and No. 10 Advanced Micro Devices Inc. (US$15.89 billion, up 64.4 percent), Gartner added.
The combined sales of the top 10 vendors hit US$257.54 billion in 2021, up 22.9 percent from a year earlier, according to Gartner.
(By Chang Chien-chung and Frances Huang)
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