Chipmakers that have set their sights on digital televisions could get a boost from growing set sales in coming years, according to a report from El Segundo-based market research group iSuppli Corp.
“For semiconductor suppliers, the next few years will be a period of rapidly rising sales,and opportunity,in the digital TV market,” said Shyam Nagrani, analyst for display electronics at iSuppli.
Sales of chips that go into digital TVs are set to total about $14 billion in 2011, more than double this year’s sales, according to the report.
Digital TV shipments are expected to hit 230 million sets by 2011, almost triple what they were last year.
Some local chipmakers could see gains as more TVs are sold, including Broadcom Corp., Microsemi Corp., Teridian Semiconductor Corp.,all based in Irvine,and Costa Mesa’s Irvine Sensors Corp.
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Broadcom’s Irvine HQ: looking to grow sales of digital TV chips |
Broadcom already is a top consumer electronics player with chips in DVD players and video game and handheld devices, and is looking to have a bigger role in digital TV, spokesman Bill Blanning said.
Chips are being used to power multiple parts of digital TVs, including audio and video circuit boards, liquid crystal displays, backlights and others.
“The growth of the digital TV chip market parallels the expansion of the digital television market itself,” Nagrani said.
Customer demand for the “latest and greatest” and falling prices are driving sales of digital TVs, according to Nagrani.
“Consumer interest in digital TV is being stimulated by the very attractive form factors of flat-panel TVs,and even more so by major price declines,” Nagrani said.
Prices for TVs with liquid crystal display screens have fallen more than 35% during each of the past two years, according to iSuppli.
Under federal legislation, in 2009 U.S. analog broadcasts are set to end. Other countries have similar deadlines, with most converting to fully digital transmissions by 2015, the report showed.
Memory Drives
Santa Ana’s STEC Inc., a maker of memory products for industrial uses, is going after a new market with a line of devices dubbed “solid-state storage drives.”
Solid state drives use memory chips instead of the rotating platters found in traditional disk drives. They cost more but are more rugged and reliable. That makes them appealing to the military and industrial users.
The company is looking to sell the drives to businesses, which use them to search databases and process complex transactions, among other tasks.
Shares of STEC have recovered in recent weeks after a three-month downturn where they fell about 30%.
At a recent check, the company had a market value of about $350 million.
Western Digital’s Lawyer
Raymond Bukaty, general counsel for Lake Forest disk drive maker Western Digital Corp., made it on a list of the nation’s top-paid corporate lawyers, according to a report in trade magazine Corporate Counsel.
Bukaty ranked No. 76 on the list of 100 lawyers.
The lawyers were ranked by their salaries and bonuses for 2006.
Based on company filings, Bukaty, 49, made about $960,000 in salary and bonuses at Western Digital last year, the most recent figures available. Including stock options, Bukaty made around $2.3 million, according to an estimate on Businessweek.com.
At the end of 2006, Bukaty owned about 188,000 shares of Western Digital.
Bukaty joined Western Digital in 1999 as vice president of corporate law. In 2002, he was promoted to general counsel.
Prior to joining Western Digital, Bukaty served at Fluor Corp., which was based in Irvine at the time. Before that, he was a principal with Los Angeles-based law firm Riordan & McKinzie, now part of Bingham McCutchen LLP. Bukaty focused on corporate law and securities issues at Riordan.
Chipmaker Gets Nod
Lake Forest-based Newport Media Inc., a maker of chips for digital audio and mobile TV, was recognized on a list of emerging startups to watch by tech Web site EETimes.com.
The list of 60 companies used to be known as the Silicon 60.
Newport Media has close ties with another local veteran chipmaker, Newport Beach’s Conexant Systems Inc.
Dwight Decker, former chief executive and current chairman of Conexant, joined Newport Media’s board a few months back.
Before starting Newport Media, Chief Executive Mohy Abdelgany headed up a business unit at Newport Beach-based Skyworks Solutions Inc., which includes Conexant’s former wireless chip unit.
In the mid-1990s, Abdelgany was at Rockwell Semiconductor Systems Inc., which later became Conexant.
Newport Media’s vice president of engineering also is from Conexant.
