International Data Corp. (IDC) said the PC semiconductor market including desktop and portable models will grow at a compound annual growth rate of 7.8 percent from 2003 to be worth 66.1 billion dollars by 2008.

"The recovery of the PC semiconductor market will hit its stride in 2004, specifically in the second half of the year," Shane Rau, US-based IDC's lead PC semiconductor analyst, said in a statement issued in Singapore.

"Carrying the recovery along will be the key trends of mobility, connectivity, and increasing overlap between the consumer and PC markets," he added.

Rau told AFP that excluding Japan, PCs sold in the Asia-Pacific region in 2004 will represent approximately 22 percent of desktop PC semiconductor revenue and 12 percent of mobile PC semiconductor revenue.

"By 2008, we expect that the region will represent 30 percent of desktop PC semiconductor revenue and about 13 percent of mobile PC semiconductor revenue," Rau added.

IDC said the economic recovery and rising PC demand boosted the global PC semiconductor market in the second half of 2003.

However, this revenue growth was largely attributed to rising semiconductor unit sales, rather than rising average selling prices.

This revenue recovery is also largely contributed to by sales of systems to consumers, as opposed to corporations, which are expected to boost 2004 deliveries of PC semiconductors.

Mobile PC semiconductor revenue will grow at a healthy consolidated annual rate of 16.1 percent in the five-year period, compared with desktop PC semiconductor revenue growth of 2.9 percent.

As a result, mobile PC semiconductor revenues will nearly equal that of desktop PC semiconductor revenues by 2008, up from about 50 percent in 2003, IDC said.

SPACE.WIRE