Last year, after lagging behind Intel for a few years, Samsung’s semiconductor business finally recorded higher revenues than its US rival. Samsung’s semiconductor revenues overtook Intel’s for the first time since 2018.

The Korean tech giant had a 12.3% semiconductor market share and recorded $73.1 billion in revenue in 2021 (via Gartner). Intel dropped to 2nd place with 12.2% and $72.5 billion in revenue.

SK Hynix took 3rd place in 2021 with a share of 6.1% in the semiconductor market. Qualcomm was 5th with 4.6%, MediaTek was 7th (3%), Nvidia climbed to 9th place with 2.8%, and AMD also gained four spots to enter the top 10 semiconductor giants with 2.7% market share.

According to the report, DRAM sales accounted for 27.9% of all semiconductor sales last year. Revenues were up 33.2%.

Other market segments also grew in 2021 compared to 2020, contributing to a higher semiconductor demand. The wireless communications market, which includes smartphones, increased by 24.6%. The automotive segment outperformed all others with 34.9% YoY growth.

China loses semiconductor revenue while South Korea tops the charts

Per country, South Korea recorded the highest growth in the global semiconductor market with a 19.3% share, thanks to memory sales.

China’s global semiconductor share declined from 6.7% in 2020 to 6.5% in 2021. Huawei’s semiconductor company ‘HiSilicon’ experienced a massive drop of 81% in revenue, from $8.2 billion to $1.5 billion over one year.

Analysts attribute HiSilicon’s massive losses to its parent company, Huawei, and the heavy sanctions imposed by the United States government.

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