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TSMC announced on May 15 that it will construct a new 12-inch wafer fab specializing in advanced process nodes in Arizona. The fab is expected to break ground in 2021 and enter mass production in 2024. TSMC will be manufacturing semiconductor chips with 5nm process technology, at a capacity of 20k wafer starts per month. Funding for the project is expected to reach about US$12 billion, to be invested across nine years starting in 2021. The DRAMeXchange research division of TrendForce estimates annual CAPEX for the project to be about $1.3 billion on average. Given that TSMC’s annual CAPEX for 2019 and 2020 is about $15 billion on average, the Arizona project would account for less than 10% of TSMC’s overall CAPEX.
According to TrendForce’s latest investigations, owing to the gradual easing of the China-U.S. trade war and increased packaging and testing demand for 5G, AI chips, and smartphones, the global packaging and testing (OSAT, outsourced semiconductor assembly and test) industry was able to sustain the upward trend of its quarterly revenue in 1Q20. The global top 10 OSAT companies’ revenues combined for US$5.903 billion in 1Q20, a 25.3% increase YoY. However, as the demand of end devices came to a screeching halt because of the COVID-19 pandemic, the OSAT industry may potentially start to decline in 2H20.
According to the latest investigations by the DRAMeXchange research division of TrendForce, DRAM suppliers were able to successfully reduce their inventories in 1Q20, with significantly lower inventory levels at the end of 1Q20 compared to the beginning of the year. Hence, suppliers are no longer under imminent pressure to slash prices, and overall DRAM ASP rose by about 0-5% QoQ. However, while governments responded to the COVID-19 pandemic by implementing citywide and nationwide lockdown policies, the resultant logistic disruptions in turn affected DRAM bit shipment as well. Therefore, in spite of the minor rise in ASP, global DRAM revenue decreased by 4.6% QoQ, reaching US$14.8 billion.
According to the latest investigations by the LEDinside research division of TrendForce, owing to the continued shrinking of pixel pitches, LED shipment for video wall is expected to undergo further growth in 2020. Although the current yearly revenue forecast has been revised from the pre-pandemic figure of US$2.261 billion down to US$1.946 billion, it still represents a 3.7% YoY growth.
According to the latest investigations by the WitsView research division of TrendForce, the spread of the COVID-19 pandemic has diminished the global production of smartphones and also affected the market shares of different display panel technologies used in smartphones. As smartphone brands are proactive in adopting AMOLED panels for their phones, the penetration rate of AMOLED phones in the overall smartphone market is still projected to increase from 31.0% in 2019 to 35.6% in 2020. On the other hand, the penetration rate of TFT-LCD phones (including those with LTPS or a-Si panels) is projected to undergo a yearly decrease.
