TSMC sees flat sales in October

Foundry chipmaker Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co. Ltd (TSMC) saw its sales on an unconsolidated basis slip for the second month running in October. The fall was to about $820 million in October 2006 from $820 million in September.

While being approximately at the same level compared to September 2006, the company's sales were up 2.4 percent over October 2005. However, this was lower than the 6.5 percent shown by September 2006 sales compared with 2005. Revenues for January through October 2006 totaled about $8.14 billion, an increase of 27.3 percent over the same period in 2005.

It should be noted that foundries have outsold the market as a whole in the first three quarters of 2006 and that the overall market is expected to achieve annual growth of about 10 percent.

On a consolidated basis, TSMC net sales for October 2006 were about $825 million, a decrease of 0.6 percent from September 2006; revenues for January through October 2006 totaled about $8.22 billion.

- Peter Clarke
EE Times Europe