IT and telecom to account for 70% of PCB sales by 2004 -
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Published on: 1/29/2001
Last Visited: 6/22/2001
On May 17 , at a PCB ( printed circuit board ) symposium sponsored by the Taiwan Printed Circuit Association ( TPCA ) , Andrew Chen , vice-president of sales and marketing for Compeq Manufacturing , said the overall value of the PCB market could reach US$1.36 trillion in 2004.Although the dot-com closures have had a serious impact on the PCB industry , Chen nonetheless expects the industry to grow by 50 % between 1999 and 2004 , with PCBs for IT and telecommunications products making up the largest share of the growth , reaching 70 % of the total PCBs produced in 2004.
Mass-produced substrate boards for home electronics will have a compounded annual growth rate ( CAGR ) of 2.7 % , while demand for multi-layer boards will grow at a CAGR of 7 % to reach US$31 billion by 2005.By comparison , HDI ( high-density interconnect ) substrate and IC substrate will have CAGRs of 25 % and 20 % , respectively.
Chen said that by 2003 , 80 % of mobile phones produced will rely on HDI technology.If each mobile phone uses 0.07 square feet of substrate , and the mobile phone market grows at a CAGR of 10 % per year , the demand for HDI substrate could reach 40 million square feet by 2003.
In IT product PCBs , the growth of networking products is a very important area to watch , said Chen.Although the market is currently plagued by excess inventories , in the long term networking equipment has the potential to provide huge opportunities for the PCB industry.Products such as routers have a low technology threshold but high volume potential , while DWDM switches have a higher technology threshold , but higher selling price.Therefore , PCB manufacturers should carefully consider which end of the spectrum to enter to gain the greatest benefit for their companies.
Dr. Shen-nan Tong , vice chairman and general manager of Unicap Electronics , said Taiwanese PCB suppliers have been competing with similar quality products for a long time.Although Taiwan has captured 10 % of the world PCB market , intra-industry competition has become extremely fierce.
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