No One Compares To Intel In Global Semiconductor Market Share

Semiconductor stocks have made a lot of headlines in recent months.

On Monday, Broadcom Ltd AVGO made a massive $130 billion bid for QUALCOMM, Inc. QCOM.

NVIDIA Corporation NVDA and Advanced Micro Devices, Inc. AMD have been two of the hottest stocks in the market in the past couple of years.

The semiconductor industry has exploded in size over the past two decades. Global semiconductor sales reached $340 billion in 2016, up from just $204 billion back in 2000. However, despite the massive growth of a number of semiconductor giants, there's still one unrivaled behemoth with a commanding global semiconductor market share lead: Intel Corporation INTC.

Even with a combined market cap of more than $200 billion, a combined Qualcomm-Broadcom would still only be the third largest semiconductor company in the world, according to Statista.

The chart below shows the top global semiconductor companies by market share, and Intel’s 15.9 percent share is more than triple every other company except for Samsung’s 11.8 percent share. Qualcomm and Broadcom would combine for 8.4 percent market share.

That relatively modest market share is good news for Qualcomm investors hoping the deal makes it past antitrust regulators. Even after the $70 per-share bid price was announced, Qualcomm’s shares are trading at around $63 per share. The roughly 10 percent discount to the buyout price suggests there's meaningful skepticism that the deal will go through in a timely manner.

Qualcomm management has indicated it plans to oppose the buyout and believes the bid price doesn’t reflect the full value of the company.

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