Electronics.ca Publishing: Programmable Logic Chips - Markets Reach $9.6 Billion By 2016

KIRKLAND, QC, CANADA, October 08, 2010 (Press-News.org) ELECTRONICS.CA PUBLICATIONS, the electronics industry market research and knowledge network, announces the availability of a new report entitled "Programmable Logic ICs Market Shares and Forecasts, Worldwide, 2010-2016". Programmable logic vendors are able to address an increasing number of ASIC and ASSP opportunities. As ASICs and ASSPs are displaced by FPGAs, a significant market opportunity opens. Programmable logic IC markets are driven by the benefits of added convenience and increased productivity. Portable electronic design is becoming more challenging as product revisions require more advanced feature function packages.

Demands for improvements in the portable electronics markets include need for low active and static power consumption, small footprint packages, design security, higher integration, and live at power-up. The principal competitive factors in the PLD market include demand for broadband applications and broadband enabled devices.

Altera Stratix IV family has been the fastest ramping FPGA product in the history of the PLD industry. Customer familiarity with existing vendors and entrenched products are compelling market forces. New product families are positioned to compete favorably against ASICs and ASSPs. Programmable logic ICs are positioned to compete against other types of chips such as microcontrollers, microprocessors, and digital signal processors.

Designers can add functionality of chips. Features can be added to PLDs using pre-built and pre-verified IP cores. By incorporating more functionality and logic capacity on a programmable Chip while providing the necessary design tools and IP cores to design a reliable system, programmable logic vendors can enhance the advantages of PLDs over competing solutions.

As is true of the semiconductor industry as a whole, the digital logic segment and the PLD sub-segment are intensely competitive, and each successive product generation is characterized by rapid technological change and price decline. Programmable logic integrated circuit markets are poised to achieve significant growth because the programmable units have an opportunity to achieve ASIC and ASSC market segment penetration. With increasingly shortened product cycles and higher costs to develop a component, the programmable logic components become an attractive alternative to the more rigid semiconductor devices.

The 'process technology gap' between PLDs and ASIC and ASSP alternatives will increase over time and, when combined with the traditional PLD advantages of greater flexibility, lower development cost, and faster time-to-market, should drive the accelerated adoption of PLDs.

A decline in programmable logic semiconductor product selling prices has increased the opportunity for growth in the market. As the selling prices of products have decreased over time, vendors have been able to offset the selling price decreases by reducing manufacturing costs, improving yields, and increasing unit sales.

Ongoing efforts to keep pace with the decline in prices is a significant market factor. Revenues and gross margins are a matter of constant concern in the industry. International sales account for a majority of total sales. Markets for programmable logic integrated circuit ICs at $3.5 billion in 2009 are anticipated to reach $9.6 billion by 2016, due in part to the demand for flexible devices to meet Internet and broadband opportunities.

Broadband market driving forces are articulated in part through the Internet on Ethernet networks. There are 2.5 billion Internet users. Wireless handsets are connecting to the broadband networks. There are 157 million broadband wireless handset users, out of a total 4.7 billion total wireless handset users. Cell phones have changed the world forever, they are inexpensive, affordable to almost every person on earth. Broadband is bringing the Internet to cell phones. Programmable logic ICs support broadband roll out.

Worldwide broadband markets are poised to achieve significant growth as broadband finds new uses and leverages existing ones. Costs of broadband devices are expected to decrease rapidly in response to the continuing economies of scale. Markets for Programmable logic ICs are compelling due to their innovation and flexibility.

Details of the new report, table of contents and ordering information can be found on Electronics.ca Publications' web site:
http://www.electronics.ca/publications/products/Programmable-Logic-ICs-Market-Shares-and-Forecasts-Worldwide%2C-2010-to-2016.html

Electronics.ca Publications offers market research for the semiconductor, advanced materials, nanotechnology, electronics manufacturing, wireless technology and converging markets. For more information, please visit our website at http://www.electronics.ca