By Agence France-Presse Global semiconductor sales edged up to $12.9 billion in July 2003, up from $12.5 billion a month earlier and a 10.5% increase from July 2002, an industry organization said Sept. 2. The San Jose, Calif.-based Semiconductor Industry Association (SIA) said PC-related products were the strongest sector, with microprocessors up 5.6% and dynamic random access memory chips (DRAMs) up 8.2% over June. "July's sales reflect the continued strengthening of the semiconductor market, and we believe that we will exceed our forecasted sequential growth of 5.9% for the third quarter," said SIA President George Scalise. "With seasonal third-quarter patterns, such as consumer builds for back-to-school and the year-end holidays, we expect sequential increases from the consumer, computation and communications sectors." July sales in Japan rose 4.8% on a monthly basis, with the rest of the Asia-Pacific region showing sales growth of 2.9%, Europe up 2.3%, and the Americas gaining 1% over June. Copyright Agence France-Presse, 2003
