LONDON, UK & BANGALORE, INDIA: Hold on to your horses, folks. It may not be so bad a year after all for the global semiconductor industry, according to Malcolm Penn, CEO, Future Horizons.

Recently presenting the mid-term semiconductor industry outlook in London, he said that the overall semiconductor outlook for 2008 was somewhere between 7-10 perfect. This includes 5-8 percent unit growth plus 2 percent ASP growth.

And the number is ???



"We're plumping for scenario 'C'," he says.

Penn ruled out any changes in forecast, saying that the industry would likely grow at about 10 percent this year, although 12 percent growth was still possible.

Will unit sales will hold up then? This is one of the great unknown answers! Unit visibility is bad, very bad, he adds. The inventory excesses/adjustments can always catch you out, but the underlying 10 percent pa annual unit growth will continue.

When put together with increasing ASPs, will it start to deliver strong overall chip market growth? Penn assumes that this may happen either second half of this year at best, or second half of next year at worst.

And, how has the memory market been doing among all of this? Typically, it has been lousy, and it is this that is holding back the overall market numbers.