Samsung Electronics Chairman Lee Jae-yong returned to Seoul on Friday after his trip to Europe, where he made a surprise visit to Vatican City to meet with Pope Francis, and met with business counterparts for cooperation. During the 10-day trip, Lee traveled to Germany, France and Italy, and checked on the company's business operations there. “The spring has come,” he told reporters without further explanation, upon his arrival at the Seoul Gimpo Business Aviation Center. He did

SK hynix on Thursday said that its high-bandwidth memory chips have already sold out until 2025, boasting its leadership in the advanced memory chip market for artificial intelligence. "Demand for ultra-fast, high-capacity and low-power memory products for AI applications is expected to see explosive growth,” said SK hynix CEO Kwak Noh-jung during a press conference held at the company’s headquarters in Icheon, Gyeonggi Province. “Our HBM chips from the 2024 output have al

After logging losses for five consecutive quarters, Samsung Electronics' chip business returned to the black in the first quarter this year, thanks to rising demand for high-end chips and a surge in chip prices. In its earnings report for the January-March period on Tuesday, Samsung said its chip division reported 23.1 trillion won ($16.7 billion) in sales and 1.91 trillion won in operating profits. The profit comes after the company suffered operating losses for five consecutive quarters.

China outpaced Korea in the shipment of organic light-emitting display panels for IT gadgets for the first time in the first quarter of this year, stirring concerns that Korean manufacturers could eventually be pushed out of the market by Chinese rivals. According to Chinese market tracker Cinno Research on Monday, China's OLED shipments for IT gadgets including smartphones and tablet PCs accounted for 53.4 percent of the total in the January-March period, ahead of Korea’s 46.6 percen

Samsung Electronics Chairman Lee Jae-yong met with top executives of German optics manufacturer Zeiss, a crucial partner for the Korean tech giant's push to lead the burgeoning market for artificial intelligence chips, during his recent trip to Europe. According to Samsung on Sunday, its chief toured the Zeiss headquarters in Oberkochen on Friday and discussed long-term partnerships with Zeiss Group CEO Karl Lamprecht and Zeiss Semiconductor Manufacturing Technology CEO Andreas Pecher. Lee&

Hyundai Motor Group on Wednesday unveiled a slew of new vehicles at the 2024 Beijing International Automotive Exhibition, ramping up efforts to boost its sluggish presence in the world's largest automotive market. At the Beijing Auto Show, one of the biggest motor shows that has returned in-person after four years, all three brands of the Korean auto giant -- Hyundai Motor, Kia and Genesis -- promised to introduce electric vehicles tailored for Chinese customers. Unveiling the Ioniq 5 N hig

South Korean robotics startup WIRobotics aims to transform the walking experience via its award-winning wearable robot WIM, made lighter and more convenient for everyday use, the company's chief said Wednesday. "We believe humans will be able to enhance walking and physical abilities with the assistance of the interactive robotics technology, and have thought wearable robots will be optimal," WIRobotics CEO and Chief Technology Officer Kim Yong-jae said at the press conference in

SK hynix is joining hands with TSMC, the world’s top foundry, to develop High Bandwidth Memory 4 and cutting-edge packaging technology, the company said on Friday. Under the partnership agreement, the two sides plan to proceed with the development of HBM4, the sixth-generation model of the advanced memory chip, and enhance logic and HBM integration through advanced packaging technology, SK hynix said. "We expect a strong partnership with TSMC to help accelerate our efforts for open co

SK hynix Chief Executive Officer Kwak Noh-jung underscored the importance of cooperation between South Korea and the US, warning that it is "dangerous" to concentrate semiconductor supply chains in any one region, during his visit to Washington. Speaking at the “Chips for America: Execute for Global Success” forum on Wednesday, Kwak also noted that SK hynix is working to develop highly advanced technologies to meet the growing needs in the artificial intelligence market. Th

Samsung Electronics, the world's top memory chip maker by revenue, has developed the industry's fastest LPDDR5X memory chip optimized for on-device artificial intelligence applications, the company said Wednesday. The new Low Power Double Data Rate 5X manifests the highest performance of up to 10.7 gigabits-per-second and is the smallest in size among existing products leveraging the 12-nanometer-class process technology, the company said. The speed is equal to sending about 20 4-gigab

South Korea’s total market cap increased by nearly 100 trillion won ($72 billion) during the first quarter of this year, backed by jumps in stock prices in key industries, including semiconductors, data showed Tuesday. According to a report from local corporate tracker Korea CXO Institute, the combined market cap of 2,692 local firms jumped 96 trillion won during the January-March period to reach 2,599 trillion won. The figures exclude the value of preferred shares. The number of stocks wi

The US government announced Monday that it will award up to $6.4 billion to Samsung Electronics for its chip fabrication facilities in Taylor, Texas. "The return of leading-edge chip manufacturing to America is a major new chapter in our semiconductor industry," said White House National Economic Adviser Lael Brainard in a press briefing. US Secretary of Commerce Gina Raimondo also revealed that the subsidy plan, coming under the US Chips Act, will support Samsung's two chip produ

Samsung Electronics and LG Electronics, the leading home appliance giants in Korea, are participating in this year’s Milan Design Week this week to showcase their new built-in appliances incorporating artificial intelligence and connectivity. Milan Design Week is one of the largest international design and furniture exhibitions, held in the city in northern Italy with the participation of some 2,300 companies. This year the event runs from Tuesday to Sunday. The tech giants have also set u

Korean IT giant Kakao joined AI Alliance, the global open-source community dedicated to the responsible development of artificial intelligence, becoming the first Korean firm to do so, the company said Friday. “We will work together with the AI Alliance to establish an open AI ecosystem meeting the global standard for the open, responsible and safe development of AI technology,” Kakao AI Safety Leader Kim Kyung-hoon said. “We will take on the social responsibility as a digital

South Korea is largely aligned with the US government’s export curbs on chips to China, but it is also making efforts to maintain trade ties with Beijing, Korea’s trade minister said in the US on Wednesday. Minister of Trade, Industry and Energy Ahn Duk-geun, who is visiting the US for the first time after he was inaugurated in January this year, added that the government is working to ensure the US trade curbs do not hurt the interests of Korean chipmakers. "Our basic stance is

US chip giant Intel is teaming up with Naver, Korea's leader in artificial intelligence, in an apparent move to counter Nvidia's dominance in the burgeoning AI chip market. Unveiling its more powerful next-generation AI accelerator, Gaudi 3, on Tuesday, Intel CEO Pat Gelsinger said the cutting-edge central processing unit has been enhanced to perform better than Nvidia's graphic processing unit "at a fraction of the cost." He also said the company is working together wit

Samsung Electronics is striving to shed the reputation of its flagship Galaxy smartphones as "ajeossi" phones among teens and users in their 20s, with short films starring popular TV celebrities. An "ajeossi" is an older married man or an uncle in Korean, but in this context, it implies a sense of being "old" or "out of style." The world's largest smartphone maker by shipment said its short film series, “S24 Hours Movie Series,” starring a

South Korean chipmakers Samsung Electronics and SK hynix have been boosting investment in the US to secure federal subsidies and get ahead in the intensifying competition in the advanced chip packaging and artificial intelligence chip sectors. Samsung Electronics, the world's top memory chipmaker that also runs chip design and foundry businesses, is reportedly planning to increase its investment in its semiconductor fabrication plant currently under construction in Taylor, Texas. According

The powerful earthquake that hit semiconductor powerhouse Taiwan last week may push up memory chip prices temporarily, as chipmakers there face operational disruptions, according to market watchers on Sunday. The earthquake, which struck off the east coast of island with a magnitude of 7.4 on Wednesday, put the tech industry on edge, as Taiwan is home to 18 percent of global chip manufacturing capacity and approximately 92 percent of the world's advanced semiconductors are produced there. M

As governments around the world fiercely compete to boost their semiconductor industries by distributing large subsidies, South Korea is pointed out as falling behind other chip powerhouses, raising concerns about the gap widening in the future. On Tuesday, the Japanese Ministry of Economy, Trade and Industry approved subsidies of up to 590 billion yen ($3.9 billion) for chip foundry venture Rapidus, adding to its promise earlier to provide funds worth some 330 billion yen into the chip project.