Semiconductor WFE 2023 In Review, 2024 Outlook

China's WFE spend in 2023 was ~1.5x Taiwan & ~2x Korea

Wafer Fab Equipment revenues of the top 5 global manufacturers amounted to $23.5 billion in Q423, an increase of 3.45% QoQ but a decrease of 7.5% YoY.

For 2023 as a whole WFE revenues amounted to $93 billion, representing a YoY decrease of just ~1%. This was despite the fact that most, including myself, had originally anticipated that revenues would decline in the order of 20% YoY.

Indeed, 2023 revenues were on track for that 20% decline through H123. However, the data from the third and fourth quarters showed a robust uptick, primarily driven by a surge in sales to China.

I think you will be quite surprised by how much sales to China grew in 2023. Indeed, since China took the top spot on the WFE spending leaderboard back in 2019, the gap between China, Korea and Taiwan has widened by an astonishing amount. We discuss this, analyse the relative performance of the top 5 players last year, share our thoughts on what to expect in 2024 and dig a little further into the latest news about the different investigations into AMAT’s sales to China, all after the paywall. Thanks as always for reading!