Apple’s Semiconductor Spending Rises 10% in 2014: Gartner

Apple’s semiconductor orders have shown a 10% growth in 2014 in comparison to the previous year, reports Gartner. By ordering $25.8 billion worth of semiconductors, Apple now ranks as the second biggest semiconductor buyer, right after Samsung, which topped Gartner’s list of “Top 10 Companies by Semiconductor Design TAM” (tam = total available market).

Gartner semiconductors

Between them, Samsung and Apple consumed $57.9 billion’s worth of semiconductors last year, up $3.9 billion from a year previously, according to the data gathered by the market research firm.

“Samsung Electronics and Apple have topped the semiconductor consumption table for four consecutive years and their decisions have considerable technology and pricing implications for the whole semiconductor industry,” said Masatsune Yamaji, principal research analyst at Gartner. “However, while Samsung Electronics kept its position as the No. 1 largest customer of semiconductor chip vendors, its growth rate in 2014 was lower than the global semiconductor market’s growth, firstly because it struggled in the smartphone market, and secondly because it is withdrawing from some parts of the PC market.”

The top 10 companies include HP, Lenovo, Dell, Sony, Huawei, Cisco Systems, LG Electronics and Toshiba. These companies, together with Apple and Samsung, accounted for 37% of all the semiconductor chip vendors’ revenue for 2014. Their total spending was $125.8 billion, up $114.8 billion from 2013.

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