According to an ABI Research report, 7.95 billion smart cards and 7.99 billion IC's shipped in 2012. While smart cards shipment rose by 9.4 percent, IC showed a growth of 12.0 percent. IC revenues hit a new high, with NFC RF and secure elements providing a more established proportion of IC revenues which totaled US$2.69 billion in 2012.
In terms of overall IC market shares, NXP moved to the number one position for revenues with just shy of 30 percent share. Its success in NFC RF and secure element shipments, in excess of 200 million units combined, strengthened its IC revenue position. Samsung maintained the number one position for units shipped with over 2.9 billion SIM cards alone. Infineon has maintained its number one position for the smart card market (excluding NFC and embedded security): it had just over 25 percent share in revenues, driven by continued strong shipments into SIM, payment, and government ID markets.
The top four smart card vendors remain unchanged with Gemalto, Oberthur, G&D, and Morpho maintaining the top four market share positions, based on units. Out of these vendors, Oberthur was the only one to maintain its overall market share percentage; the rest dropping slightly. The highest level of vendor movement was within the government ID vertical.
