EW News 17/03/2004 – Only three struggle in generally bright year for semiconductors Only three struggle in generally bright year for semiconductors David Manners In a generally bright year for the semiconductor industry, only IBM Microelectronics, Freescale Semiconductor (formerly Motorola Semiconductor) and Fujitsu failed to grow last year, according to analyst iSuppli. Freescale shrank 3.7 per cent with revenues of $4.63bn. Growth leader was AMD boosted by its 60 per cent holding in the Spansion flash memory joint venture (formerly FASL – Fujitsu AMD Semiconductor Limited) which grew 48 per cent with revenues of $3.94bn. Overall the market grew 14.2 per cent, said iSuppli, led by Asia/Pac on 22 per cent growth, followed by Japan at 20 per cent. Japan overtook the US market last year to become the second largest market for semiconductors.