Friday, October 2, 2009
Global Chip Sales Down 21.3 Percent Year-to-Date. But Hey, They Rose Five Percent in August!
Worldwide sales of semiconductors in August rose five percent over July, racking up their sixth month of consecutive gains, according to the Semiconductor Industry Association. Great news were it not for the fact that at $19.1 billion, August sales were down a horrific 16.1 percent year-over-year. Furthermore, for the first eight months of 2009, sales are at $133.8 billion–about 21.3 percent below what they were at this time last year.
Could the global semiconductor industry be heading for a much anticipated recovery? It’s starting to look that way. Chip sales rose in July for the fifth consecutive month on a month-to-month basis, according to the trade group, Semiconductor Industry Association. Which is not to say sales are robust; down 18.2 percent year-over-year, they’re abysmal, but they are showing continuing signs of recovery.
The first half of 2009 has been brutal time for the IT sector. With consumers hesitant to buy and enterprise slashing IT budgets, world-wide information technology spending this year will decline six percent. That’s the word from Gartner, which back in March was claiming the decline would be just 3.8 percent.
The first three months of 2009 were brutal ones for the high-tech industry–from a job loss perspective, the worst in seven years. Challenger, Gray & Christmas on Monday said high-tech companies sacked some 84,217 employees in the first quarter, a 27 percent increase over the previous quarter and the steepest reduction the firm has seen since the Great Dark Time of 2002.
What an abundance of ugly statistics we’ve seen this past week. An increase in tech sector layoffs and people talking about them. A decrease in chip sales. A decrease in online spending. And now a decrease in corporate IT spending as well.
Oh, we’re in trouble now. Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer seems to have lost his optimistic outlook on the current economic collapse. And when a guy with a pay package valued at about $1.35 million loses his faith in the tech industry’s “buoyancy,” as Ballmer likes to call it, well, you know things are getting really ugly.
