IHS: Apple ranked as top chip buyer in 2010

小猩猩

Peter Clarke
6/8/2011 12:25 PM EDT

LONDON – Apple Inc. became the largest buyer of chips in 2010, overtaking Hewlett-Packard Co. by spending $17.5 billion to grab nearly 6 percent of global production, according to market research firm IHS-iSuppli.

Apple's chip purchasing was up 79.6 percent from $9.7 billion in 2009. In that year Apple had been in third place behind HP and Samsung. It was sixth in 2008, IHS said.

Apple spent more than 61 percent of its 2010 semiconductor budget on chips for wirelessly connected equipment such as iPhones and iPads. In contrast HP spent 82 percent of its 2010 chip-buying budget on chips for notebooks, desktop and server computers. This is clearly working to Apple's benefit. Smartphone shipments increased 62 percent in 2010 and tablet computer shipments exploded by 900 percent, driven by the debut of the iPad. Meanwhile global PC shipments, not counting tablets, grew by 14.2 percent in 2010, said IHS.