Silicon Valley, What Next?
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Silicon Valley, What Next? Craig R. Barrett The following text is based on the plenary address given at the 1993 MRS Spring Meeting in San Francisco, April 12.
Let me begin by putting tonight's topic— "Silicon Valley, What Next?"—in the proper context. We can talk about Silicon Valley, Silicon Gulch, Silicon Desert, Silicon Glen, or Silicon Island: the topic is all the same. What I really want to talk about is the future of the semiconductor industry, an industry which only a few years ago was declared almost legally dead in the United States, with no future. Today, that industry is alive and well and I hope to demonstrate that it serves as the foundation for the most vibrant manufacturing industry in the world today—namely, the electronics industry. To accomplish this, I will draw upon a few of the materials principles I learned some thirty years ago. I'll talk about some of the major industry trends, some of the technology challenges, and my projections for what will happen over the next half decade or so. In the worldwide market place, the electronics industry is the largest manufacturing industry in the world, and by far the fastest growing. It is currently estimated to be in the range of a $900 billion industry, much larger than automotive or steel. The semiconductor portion of the electronics industry is in the $60-$70 billion range, but it really forms the basis of electronics. The argument these days is that you can't have a viable electronics industry—the computer industry, home electronics, or any sort of electronics industry—without owning the base semiconductor industry that feeds it. So, most governments subscribe to the philosophy that you need to have a vibrant semiconductor industry to succeed, especially if you are interested in export marketplaces. Electronics is the biggest export market in the world.
Semiconductor Industry If you look at the industry in terms of its revenue growth over the years (Figure 1)— keeping in mind that exponential growth hardly continues forever—you will see that this industry has an enviable growth rate. Currently in the $60 to $70 billion range, it is projected by the year 2000 to be in the range
Worldwide Semiconductor Revenues 180 160 140 120 100 80 60 40 20 1966
1976 1986 1996
Figure 1. Worldwide semiconductor growth. Source: WSTS, Dataquest.
revalue
Worldwide Semiconductor Market Share 70 60 •U.S. 41.1% Japan 42.8% Europe 10.2% APAC 5.9%
70 72 74 76 78 80 82 84 86 88 90 92 Figure 2. Worldwide semiconductor market share for Japan, the United States, Europe, and APAC. Source: Dataquest.
Moore's Law
1970 1975 1980 1985 1990 1995 2000 Time • Figure 3. The "integration trend" given by Moore's law, which shows doubling of the number of transistors in an integrated circuit every 18 months for the past 30 years. Source: Intel Corp.
of $150 billion a year. The automotive industry—or any industry—would love to experience growth like this. With this kind of curve, if you just hold your market share, you have wonderful growth opportunities in front of you. Unfortun
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