NAND flash sales forecast to slide 32%, still ranked third-largest IC market this year.

IC Insights recently released its Mid-Year Update to The McClean Report 2019.  The update included IC Insights’ ranking of the 33 largest IC product categories based on their expected sales and unit shipment volumes for 2019. The 33 IC product categories are those defined by the World Semiconductor Trade Statistics (WSTS) organization.  The five largest IC product categories are shown in Figure 1.

Despite a 38% sales decline expected this year, the DRAM market is forecast to remain the largest of all IC product categories again in 2019 with sales reaching $62.0 billion, down from $99.4 billion in 2018.  IC Insights believes the DRAM market will account for 17% of total IC sales in 2019.  By comparison, DRAM sales accounted for 23.6% of the total IC market in 2018.

Figure 1

The NAND flash market is forecast to slip from second to third position in the ranking this year with total sales falling 32% to $40.6 billion.  Taken together, the DRAM and NAND flash memory categories are forecast to account for 29% of the total $357.7 billion IC market in this year compared to 38% of the total IC market in 2018.
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