Samsung Electronics and Apple remained the top semiconductor buyers in 2014, representing with a combined semiconductor demand of 17 percent, according to Gartner, Inc. Samsung Electronics and Apple together consumed $57.9 billion of semiconductors in 2014, an increase of $3.9 billion from 2013, Gartner said.

"Samsung Electronics and Apple have topped the semiconductor consumption table for four consecutive years and their decisions have considerable technology and pricing implications for the whole semiconductor industry," said Masatsune Yamaji, principal research analyst at Gartner. "However, while Samsung Electronics kept its position as the No. 1 largest customer of semiconductor chip vendors, its growth rate in 2014 was lower than the global semiconductor market's growth, firstly because it struggled in the smartphone market, and secondly because it is withdrawing from some parts of the PC market."

Preliminary Ranking of Top 10 Companies by Semiconductor Design TAM, Worldwide, 2014 (Billions of Dollars)

Source: Gartner (January 2015)

The top 10 companies bought $125.6 billion of semiconductors, to account for 37 percent of semiconductor chip vendors' worldwide revenue in 2014. This was up from $114.8 billion, accounting for 36.4 percent in 2013. The top 10 outperformed the semiconductor buying market and grew by 9.4 percent overall.

Through mergers and acquisitions, fourth-place Lenovo significantly increased its semiconductor demand in 2014 with growth of 33.9 percent. With growth of 21.6 percent, Huawei climbed to No. 7 in 2014, up from No. 9 in 2013, while LG Electronics climbed to No. 9 in 2014, up from No. 10 in 2013, with growth of 15.9 percent.