SCOTTSDALE, Ariz.--Contrary to popular belief, In-Stat/MDR claims the ASIC market is alive and growing--at least in Asia-Pacific.

Worldwide merchant market dollar consumption of customer-specific, cell-based designs, independent of complexity and/or functionality, is forecast to grow from $6.78 billion in 2003 to $10.76 billion by 2008, according to In-Stat/MDR.

This translates to a compound annual growth rate (CAGR), between 2003 and 2008, of 9.7 between, according to the firm.

Consumption in Asia Pacific will grow at more than twice the pace of Europe and Japan, and 6.4 percentage points faster than that of The Americas.

Asia Pacific will also represent the only region to see future design starts continuously increase over the forecast period.

The market research firm said design starts in customer-specific, cell-based design segment of the ASIC market will flatten out and decline somewhat in the future.

However, structured ASIC and User-Programmable Logic (UPL) design starts will continue their upward trend, without slowdown in the future.

"All in all, when all the elements, or in this case design methodologies, are accounted for, design starts, for the overall ASIC market, will continue to slowly increase, i.e., the upsides will more than equalize the downsides," said Jerry Worchel, a principal analyst with In-Stat/MDR, in a statement.