The recession period is having its toll on semi- conductor market as well. The sales dropped to 9.8 percent in November 2008.  In other words, worldwide semiconductor sales fell to 20.8 billion dollars in November. This means decrease of 9.8 percent as compared to the sales in November during the  last year. The statistics were revealed by  the Semiconductor Industry Association (SIA).

 Memory producers have been affected even worse. In November 2007 their sales dropped to $4.9 billion which went further down to $3.5 November 2008, a 28 percent drop.

"The worldwide economic crisis is having an impact on demand for semiconductors, but to a lesser degree than some other major industry sectors," said SIA president George Scalise. "We expect the industry will remain the second largest exporter in the US for 2008."

Semiconductor manufacturers represent a large business base in the Valley, with Intel Corp. (NASDAQ: INTC), Microchip Technology Inc. (NASDAQ: MCHP) and ON Semiconductor Corp. (NASDAQ: ONNN) based there.

Market research firm Gartner has apprehension that worldwide semiconductor revenue would drop further during the next year.