Fab utilization, capacity sluggish

SOURCE: GARTNER DATAQUEST

Recent fab capacity and utilization statistics released by two of the leading market research firms show trends in line with continued industry sluggishness. The Gartner Dataquest chart at right reveals ratios of overall silicon consumed compared with fab capacity in the 70% neighborhood for 2002, although sub-130-nm utilization exceeded 90%. Dataquest's Klaus-Dieter Rinnen noted during a presentation at ISS North America in January that yield improvements at the 130-nm node effectively provide more capacity with little additional investment.

SOURCE: VLSI RESEARCH ILLUSTRATIONS BY JAMES SCHLESINGER

A graph from VLSI Research (left) compares realized and total capacity. VLSI's Dan Hutcheson said at ISS that "overall utilization continues to decline as IC makers cut production to raise prices." He noted earlier warnings from his group that cheap equipment continues to be offered, which hits the fab utilization data hard. Tracking fab utilization by technology node since January 2002, Hutcheson shows numbers in the high 80s to high 90s for the 90- and 130-nm nodes. He believes that capacity below 90% is also below the point where chipmakers are likely to buy more equipment.