The two major Taiwanese semiconductor chip foundries saw their revenues decline almost 60 per cent last month from a year ago.

Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Company (TSMC) and United Microelectronics Corporation (UMC) both reported that decreases in sales at the end of 2008 continued into January.

TSMC said that its revenue in January was $365.6 million (NTD12.436 billion), off 5.5 per cent  from December and down 58.9 per cent  year-on-year. It is the largest revenue decrease since the company was founded in 1994. TSMC's January revenue was at its lowest level since February 2003.

UMC reported January 2009 revenues of $92.6 million (NTD3.153 billion), a decline of 31.6 per cent  from December and off 61.6 per cent  from January 2008.

TSMC and UMC are the world's two leading independent chip foundries and together comprise two-thirds of the global semiconductor foundry sector. X