Semi equipment sales jump 14 percent

Worldwide sales of semiconductor manufacturing equipment grew 14 percent to a record 64.5 billion dollars last year, reports Semi. For the second year in a row, South Korea claimed the largest market, even though its sales declined slightly. China surged to become the second largest market, while Taiwan fell to third place. Sales for the global wafer processing equipment market segment rose 15 percent, while other front-end segment sales jumped 9 percent. Total test equipment sales increased 20 percent as assembly and packaging sales increased 2 percent.