SAN FRANCISCO — SEMI said semiconductor equipment sales will reach $44 billion in 2014, up 21% over estimated 2013 equipment spending, according to its mid-year forecast released Monday.

SEMI had previously forecast 2013 would see a spike of 10% in equipment sales, but has now revised that figure to a drop of 1.7% for the year.

Following two years of conservative capital investments by major chip manufacturers, semiconductor equipment spending is forecast to grow to $43.98 billion in 2014, up from $36.29 billion projected this year. The trade group cited significant NAND flash fab investments by Samsung in China and Toshiba/SanDisk in Japan, and investments by Intel, including its fabs in Ireland.

Most major regions of the world will see significant equipment spending increases, SEMI said. Front-end wafer processing equipment will grow 24% in 2014 to $35.6 billion, up from $28.7 billion in 2013.  Test equipment and assembly and packaging equipment will also experience growth next year, rising to $3.18 billion (up 6%) and $2.9 billion (up 14%), respectively. If the forecast proves accurate, it would make 2014 be the second-largest spending year ever, surpassed only by the $47.7 billion spent in 2000.

China is forecast to grow 82%, Europe (79%), South Korea (31%), Japan (21%), North America (9%), and Taiwan (2%). Taiwan will continue to be the world’s largest spender, with $10.6 billion estimated for 2014, followed by North America at $8.75 billion and Korea with $8.74 billion. The following results are given in terms of market size in billions of U.S. dollars and percentage growth over the prior year: