IC Insights, a market research agency, has recently updated this quarter's "MacLean Report 2022". The report showed higher earnings for microprocessors and power discretes this year, but sales growth in optoelectronics slowed amid greater risks to the global economy.

Despite a backdrop of inflation, soaring energy costs, ongoing supply chain problems, the COVID-19 pandemic and the Russian-Ukrainian conflict, the agency remains optimistic that total semiconductor sales will grow 11% in 2022 — the same growth rate as a year earlier . And hit a record $680.7 billion in sales this year.

The report also adjusted sales growth forecasts for several major semiconductor product categories in 2022 (see chart below). These changes offset each other, keeping the overall semiconductor market growth at 11% in 2022. The report believes that the downward pressure on the economy poses a challenge to global growth and the situation is grim.

The report raised its forecast for micro component IC sales to 11 percent from 7 percent at the start of the year. This increase was driven by the embedded MPU category (now up 12%, up from 9% previously) and cellular micro-application processors (up 22%, well above the 10% forecast in January).

The report's overall forecast for total IC sales growth in 2022 remained unchanged, with an 11% increase this year to a record $567.1 billion. The report also believes that forecasts for analog ICs (up 12%) and logic ICs (up 11%) remain unchanged.

The report also lowered its forecast for total sales for this year's non-IC semiconductor market categories - optoelectronics, sensors and actuators, and discrete devices (O-S-D), which account for about 17% of total global semiconductor revenue and are now expected to grow 9% to $113.6 billion , which is mainly due to the influence of CMOS image sensors and lighting devices (mainly LEDs). However, weakness in optoelectronics was partially offset by strong growth in discrete semiconductors, mainly due to tight global supply and rising average selling prices (ASP), power devices (now expected to grow 11% through 2022) and diodes (expected to grow 10%) %) with higher sales growth. The report's strong 15% growth forecast for sensor/actuator semiconductors remains unchanged.