Forecast Accuracy
You have a business to run and that business’ success depends on the quality of your planning. But your planning can only be as good as the forecast you use as an input.
Objective Analysis forecasts semiconductor market revenues using an approach that has proven for over a decade to be the most consistently-accurate methodology in the industry. Our methodology, which we often explain and openly discuss, involves understanding commodity market dynamics and the impact of commodity semiconductors on the entire semiconductor market. It also is built around an understanding of capital spending (“CapEx”) as a driving force for semiconductor cycles, tempered with a deep understanding of the technology and with survey inputs from not only suppliers, but also from numerous end users of the technology.
The table below provides a review of the historical accuracy of our forecasts since 2008. Review it for yourself to see how close we came each year.
Year | Forecast | Actual |
2008 | Zero growth at best. | -3% |
2009 | Growth in the mid teens | -9% |
2010 | Should approach 30% | 32% |
2011 | Muted revenue growth: 5% | 0% |
2012 | Revenues drop as much as -5% | -2.7% |
2013 | Revenues increase nearly 10% | 4.9% |
2014 | Revenues up 20%+ | 9.9% |
2015 | Revenues up ~10% | -0.2% |
2016 | Revenues up ~10% | 1.1% |
2017 | Revenues up ~20% | 22% |
2018 | Strong start supports 10+% growth | 14% |
2019 | Semiconductors down -5% | -12.5% |
2020 | Zero growth at best | 6.8% |
2021 | Revenues grow 6% by remaining flat | 26.2% |
2022 | Total semi still grows 6% | 3.2% |
2023 | Semiconductors decline 19% | TBD |
The hot links on the years will take you to short video recordings made in December of the year prior to each of the forecasts. (NOTE: As of TechInsights’ 2022 acquisition of VLSI Research, some of these links no longer function. We are working to fix that.)
We know of no other semiconductor market research firm that is willing to provide reviews of their prior forecasts.
Many thanks to VLSI Research for recording these videos and providing them on line.