Intel said to increase chip market lead

A 300 milimeter silicon test wafer made using Intel's 45 nanometer process technology, and consisting of rows and rows of memory chips and various test structures, in seen in an undated handout photo, released November 11, 2007. Intel Corp., the world's top chipmaker, is set to increase its share of a growing global semiconductor chip market this year to 12.2 percent, research firm Gartner said on Friday.

HELSINKI (Reuters) - Intel Corp., the world's top chipmaker, is set to increase its share of a growing global semiconductor chip market this year to 12.2 percent, research firm Gartner said on Friday.

The market is expected to grow 2.9 percent from last year to $270.3 billion, Gartner said.

Intel's revenue grew more than twice as fast as the market average, boosted by strong gains in laptop chip sales. Last year Intel's global market share was 11.6 percent.

Among top vendors, Toshiba's revenue was expected to surge 28 percent in U.S. dollar terms, surpassing Texas Instruments, STMicroelectronics and Infineon. Of those three, only STM was able to slightly raise its revenue, Gartner said.

"Semiconductor vendors need to watch the performance of their end customers even closer as a major part of the industry becomes increasingly tied to consumer spending patterns," Andrew Norwood, research vice president at Gartner, said in statement.

(Reporting by Tarmo Virki)