Releasing its Year-End Total Equipment Forecast at the annual SEMICON Japan exposition, SEMI reported that worldwide sales of new semiconductor manufacturing equipment are projected to increase 9.7% to $62.1 billion in 2018, exceeding the high of $56.6 billion set last year.    The equipment market is expected to contract 4% in 2019 but grow 20.7% to reach $71.9 billion, an all-time high. The SEMI Year-end Forecast predicts wafer processing equipment will rise to 10.2% in 2018 to $50.2 b...