Worldwide sales of semiconductors rose to 17.8 billion US dollars in June, up 40.3 percent from the same month a year ago, the Semiconductor Industry Association (SIA) reported Monday.

The June figure also represents a sequential increase of 2.8 percent from the 17.3 billion dollars reported in May. Global semiconductor sales were 12.7 billion dollars in June 2003.

According to SIA, in the second quarter of 2004, global chip sales reached 53.45 billion dollars, an increase of 9.5 percent from first-quarter sales of 48.8 billion dollars. In comparison, worldwide semiconductor sales were 38.1 billion dollars in the second quarter of 2003.

"Worldwide microchip sales remain on pace to reach a record of more than 214 billion dollars this year," said SIA President George Scalise. "While we expect sales in the second half of 2004 will remain strong, we expect that the growth rate going forward will be somewhat slower."

The Asia-Pacific market again showed the strongest year-on-year growth at 61 percent, followed by the Americas at 30 percent, Europe at 29 percent, and Japan at 26 percent, according to SIA, a US trade group.

The SIA said strong sales of dynamic random-access memory (DRAMs), up more than 100 percent year-on-year, were the leading driver of second-quarter growth. Wireless communications was another strong driver of demand for chips in the first half of 2004, with sales rising 86.5 percent year-on-year.

Scalise believes one of the key indicators to watch going forward is inventories. "With strong demand from most major end-use markets, we do not believe excess inventories will be a problem in most market sectors in the near term," he said.