The price of photomasks will rise in 2024 due to Global Shortage

It was recently reported that as the demand for photomasks from Chinese chip manufacturing companies and wafer foundries is still very strong, the shortage in the semiconductor photomask market has not been alleviated, and the price of photomasks is expected to rise by 2024, according to Trendforce.

Currently, the capacity utilization rate of most photomask manufacturers, including Toppan, Photronics, and Dai Nippon Printing, has reached 100% of full capacity. Some Chinese chip companies are even willing to pay extra to shorten delivery times.

The upstream of the photomask industry chain mainly includes equipment, substrates, light-shielding films and chemical reagents, the midstream is photomask manufacturing, and the downstream is the chip, flat-panel display, touch and circuit board industries.

Although China has an urgent need for domestically produced alternative photomasks, there is still a large gap between the revenue scale of domestic photomask manufacturers and leading overseas manufacturers. It is expected that by 2028, China's photomask market will reach 36 billion yuan.

As the proportion of China's semiconductor industry in the world gradually increases, the scale of the domestic semiconductor photomask market is also gradually expanding. The domestic photomask industry is expected to continue to prosper, and manufacturers are expected to achieve rapid growth.