Taipei (CNA) - MediaTek Inc., a smartphone chip designer from Taiwan, was the fourth largest integrated circuit designer worldwide in the first quarter of this year, as the company saw its revenue rise slightly from a year earlier, according to the Taipei-based Topology Research Institute.

In addition, Taiwan-based driver IC designer Novatek Microelectronics Corp. and communication network IC designer Realtek Semiconductor Corp. also made the top 10 list, at No. 8 and No. 9, respectively, Topology said.

According to a research paper released by Topology, part of the market information advisory firm TrendForce Corp., MediaTek posted US$1.71 billion in sales for the January-March period, up 1.0 percent from a year earlier, making it the fourth largest IC designer in the world.

MediaTek was the only top 5 IC designer to report a year-on-year increase in revenue in the first quarter, at a time when the global semiconductor industry has been impacted by escalating trade friction between Washington and Beijing, which slowed down demand from China, Topology said.

MediaTek's first quarter revenue fell 13.3 percent from a quarter earlier due to slow peak effects.

In the first quarter, Novatek posted US$485 million in sales, up 35.8 percent from a year earlier on the back of solid demand for touch with display driver ICs and active-matrix organic light-emitting diode driver ICs, Topology said.

However, its first quarter sales fell 2.5 percent from a quarter earlier.

Realtek benefited from strong shipments in telecommunications and display products and posted US$416 million in sales for the first quarter to take ninth place, up 14.9 percent from a year earlier and also up 7.6 percent from a quarter earlier, according to Topology.

U.S.-based Broadcom Inc. took first place after posting US$4.183 billion in sales for the first quarter, down 10.5 percent from a year earlier and also down 7.9 percent from a quarter earlier, Topology said

Qualcomm Inc., another American IC designer, came second, generating US$3.722 billion in sales for the first quarter, down 4.5 percent from a year earlier and down 0.5 percent from a year earlier, ahead of U.S.-based NVidia Corp. which posted sales of US$2.110 billion, down 24.4 percent from a year earlier and down 12.2 percent from a quarter earlier.

U.S.-based Advanced Micro Devices Inc. ranked the fifth largest IC designer after posting US$1.272 million in sales, down 22.8 percent from a year earlier and down 10.4 percent from a quarter earlier. (By Chang Chien-chung and Frances Huang)