Cell phone chip markets and ranking

LONDON – The silicon chips and other components that go into cell phones are set to make up an almost $50 billion market in 2010 and it is expected to reach a size of $71 billion in 2014, according to market research firm Forward Concepts. This represents a compound annual growth rate of 9.5 percent over the period 2010 to 2014.

The most expensive component in a cellphone is the LCD display which accounts for 31 percent of the $49.7 billion market. The digital baseband is next at 14 percent of the market followed by the image sensor worth 8 percent of the market. RF radio and communications processor each account for 7 percent while MEMS devices capture 6 percent and power management ICs are responsible for 5 percent.

The company ranking is measured against the 2009 cell phone chip market, which is estimated to have been worth about $25 billion.

Qualcomm was the cellular handset chip market leader in 2009 with a 20 percent market share. Texas Instruments was second with 14 percent, ST-Ericsson third with 10 percent and Infineon, soon to be part of Intel, had 9 percent. Next in line are MediaTek, Broadcom and Samsung, RFMD and Aptina followed by almost two dozen significant vendors of a great variety of chip types.

Other findings from Forward Concepts include: smartphone shipments are predicted to grow by 42 percent in 2010; touch screen phone shipments grew from 14 percent of all cellphone shipments in 2009 to an estimated 27 percent in 2010; and the cellphone MEMS market is expanding from basic accelerometers into microphones, gyroscopes, compasses, and RF switches so that it is collectively forecasted to reach the $6 billion level in 2014.

A 594-page study of the cellphone component market discusses over 100 companies and includes 106 figures and 99 tables. The study is priced at $3,750 for a single copy and $6,500 for an enterprise license. Details are available at:  http://fwdconcepts.com/Cellchip10