Compound Semiconductor Market - Growth, Trends, COVID-19 Impact, And Forecasts (2022 - 2027)

The compound semiconductor market is expected to register a CAGR of 5% over the forecast period 2022-2027. Compound semiconductors are made from two or more elements of the different or same group of the periodic table. These are manufactured by using various types of deposition techniques such as chemical vapor deposition, atomic layer deposition, and others. They possess unique properties like high temperature and heat resistance, enhanced frequency, high sensitivity to magnetism and faster operation and optoelectronic features are some of the key advantages boosting its demand. Moreover, the decrease in the manufacturing cost of compound semiconductors has increased its application in electronic and mobile devices.

- Global adoption of smartphones has spread rapidly due to increased penetration of the internet and the availability of low-cost devices. It is subsequently driving the growth of compound semiconductors. However, most of the smartphone manufactures are developing solar-powered smartphones by using the most efficient semiconductor that captures a high amount of light and offers a longer battery life.
- For instance, in 2019, Xiaomi has filed a design patent that indicates that the company is working on a solar-powered smartphone with the solar panels on the back of the phone. It will provide an alternative to user to charge their phone apart from conventional method, USB Type-C port, and provide most environmentally friendly phones. Additionally, Wysips, French company is developing the first transparent, thin film solar panel in order to integrate it into phones’ screens to provide extra battery power.
- Decrease in manufacturing and installation cost of LEDs has increased its application in lamps and fixtures across all sectors. Megacities concentrate on investing in infrastructure development to meet the needs of the growing population and governments are helping customer to install energy-efficient lighting sources to reduce their electricity consumption cost. For instance, in 2022, EESL (Energy Efficiency Services Limited) has celebrated completion of its one year governmental project named, Unnat Jyoti Program (UJALA). Under this program it has replaced more than 10.6 million street light bulbs with LED lights that will help to reduce 20 million tonnes of carbon-dioxide and will also reduce the electricity cost abruptly.
- High raw material and fabrication costs associated with compound semiconductors might hamper the growth of the market however, huge demand for electronic devices and wireless technologies and high investment by the major player to increase their production capacity to further reduce its manufacturing expenses will provide abundant opportunity.

Key Market Trends

Optoelectronics will experience significant growth in the forecast period

Optoelectronics will experience significant growth in the forecast period due to increased application in military services, telecommunications, automatic access control systems and medical equipments. These are used in the bundle of devices including LEDs traffic lights, information displays, optical fibers, photodiodes, solar cells and remote sensing systems, etc.

- The healthcare sector is utilizing fiber optics technologies in surgical instrumentation, disease treatment therapies, diagnosis and imaging equipment and sensor-based wearable medical devices for safety and effectiveness of the treatment. And as optical fibers are resistant to electromagnetic interference and radio frequency so they can be applied in real-time diagnostic imaging such as MRI, PET, and CT systems in the future. Many organizations and institutes are developing advanced instruments to provide effective and safe treatment for the patient.
- For instance, in October 2019, biomedical engineers of Duke University have developed a low-cost, portable optical coherence tomography (OCT) scanner that promises to bring the vision-saving technology to underserved regions. It produces images of 120 retinas that were 95 percent as sharp as those taken by current commercial systems and would be used in many retinal diseases including macular degeneration and diabetic retinopathy, as well as for glaucoma.
- Moreover, surging number of data center, strong federal policies like the solar investment tax credit, declining costs, and increasing demand across the private and public sector for clean source of energy has led to the growth of solar project across the world. For instance, United States registered an average annual growth rate of 48% in solar industry and has installed solar capacity of nearly 78 gigawatts (GW) that is enough to power 14.5 million homes. In 2019, the solar industry generated USD 18 billion of investment in the American economy according to the Solar Energy Industries Association (SEIA).
- Furthermore, the future foresees an augmented application of optoelectronic devices in the telecommunication industry, which will create abundant opportunities for the optoelectronics.

Asia Pacific to Witness Significant Growth

Asia-Pacific is expected to dominate the compound semiconductor market during the forecast period as the majority of market vendors are based out of South Korea, China, and Taiwan. Also, the region has a large number of raw material suppliers in addition to low labor costs.

- Radar, electronic warfare (EW), and communication systems are increasingly leveraging gallium nitride (GaN) technology in the defense sector to meet stringent high-performance, high-power, and long-life cycle demands and thus replacing laterally diffused MOSFET (LDMOS) components. For instance, China has replaced the Travelling Wave Tubes (TWT) with smaller solid-state systems as it delivers higher performance and scalability in the radar systems.
- Moreover, the Asian countries are spending enormously on the defense sector to upgrade their equipment with advanced and efficient technology. For instance, China’s proposed budget for 2022 totals USD 718 billion, the largest annual amount requested over the five-year period and is slightly lesser than that of the United States (USD 750 billion).
- The increase in industrial automation has gained the adoption of computer and machines for the effective and efficient control of systems. Compound semiconductor devices play a key role to ensure efficient power consumption within the reduced size of application since they can withstand elevated temperatures and voltages, also making them an ideal component. As per International Federation of Robotics 2019 report, Asia recorded maximum number of annual installations of industrial robots. China, Japan and Republic of Korea accounted 39,351, 17,364 and 11,034 units respectively and almost 80% of the total industrial robot installations were in automotive sector.
- Moreover, during COVID-19 most of the countries are employing robots to fight the pandemic. Disinfection robot UVD has been in high demand since the outbreak. Chinese hospitals have ordered more than 2,000 UVD robots from Blue Ocean Robotics.
- Pandemic has caused immense damage to the global economy, lowered the consumer’s purchasing power, and induced 2022 recession that will disrupt automotive, consumer electronics, semiconductor and IT infrastructure businesses worldwide. The relative bright site of COVID-19 is the increase in network service as shelter-in-home orders are increasing the demand for broadband activity which is a short-term positive impact on operator's revenues stream.

Competitive Landscape

The compound semiconductor market is highly competitive and is dominated by several major players like Broadcom, Skyworks Solutions, Cree, Qorvo, Analog Devices, OSRAM, GaN Systems, Skyworks Solution and Infineon Technologies. These major players with a prominent share in the market are focusing on expanding their customer base across foreign countries. These companies leverage strategic collaborative initiatives to increase their market share and increase their profitability. However, with technological advancements and product innovations, mid-size to smaller companies are increasing their market presence by securing new contracts and by tapping new markets.

February 2022 - Skyworks introduced two new front-end modules, SKY85333-11 (2.4 GHz) and SKY85747-11 (5 GHz) in its portfolio of solutions designed for high-power Wi-Fi 6 (802.11ax) applications and systems. These highly integrated FEMs incorporate switching, low-noise amplifier (LNA) with bypass and power amplifier (PA) for devices such as networking and WLAN-enabled wireless video streaming systems. They support leading reference designs based on the Qualcomm (QCA) Hawkeye family.

February 2022 - Analog Devices and Marvell had signed a technology collaboration to leverage Marvell’s industry-leading 5G digital platform and ADI’s world-class wideband RF transceiver technology to deliver fully optimized solutions for 5G base stations. As part of the collaboration, the companies will offer fully integrated 5G digital front-end (DFE) ASIC solutions with tightly coupled RF transceivers and will collaborate to develop next generation Radio Unit (RU) solutions including baseband and RF technology optimized for a diverse set of functional splits and architectures.

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