Semiconductor capital spending is on the rise and market leaders continue to make the lion``s share of investment, the soon-to-be-released March Update to the 2014 McClean Report reported. In fact, Samsung, Intel, and TSMC together will account for more than half of total semiconductor industry capex this year, IC Insights reported. Samsung and Intel lead the pack with $11 billion in spending each this year. Over the next three years, will spend $35.3 billion, with about 60% of the total targeting memory production, IC Insights forecasts. By comparison, Intel is forecast to lay out $32.6 billion.
Meanwhile, TSMC is slated to invest slightly less at $10 billion. Last year, these three companies took a slightly higher 55.5% share of total spending, compared to $51.8% this year. Among the rest of the top 10 spenders, the majority will spend at least $3.0 billion in 2014 while nine other suppliers are expected to invest $1 billion. Overall, the top 10 spenders are expected to boost overall spending in 2014 over 2013, despite flatline spending in the previous year.

 Notably, some organizations are making big increases in spending, after cuts in previous years , for example, cut spending by 28% in 2012 and a lesser 12% in 2013. This year, however, the company is expected to increase spending by 86%, the largest increase among the top 10 spenders on the list. These shifts are part of a bigger pattern in the semiconductor industry. In the past, capacity expansion and fab equipment spending were closely tied, Now, semiconductor makers are spending money to upgrade facilities over spending to build new capacity.