OpenAI CEO Sam Altman returned to South Korea over the weekend facing two mounting challenges: securing enough memory chips and raising the billions needed to build the infrastructure behind them. His surprise visit highlighted the growing importance of Samsung and SK to the ChatGPT maker, as tight memory supplies strengthen chipmakers' bargaining power while investors demand clearer returns on massive AI spending. Altman arrived Friday night and met about 50 Samsung executives in Yongin, Gyeong

SK hynix's retreat from a planned US listing of Solidigm has sent a warning to Korean conglomerates eyeing Wall Street: Seoul's tougher scrutiny of duplicate listings could derail their global fundraising ambitions. The chipmaker said Oct. 23 it had suspended plans to list its US flash memory subsidiary on the Nasdaq, shelving a potential blockbuster offering that could have valued Solidigm at up to $150 billion. While SK hynix cited market conditions, the decision followed mounting shareholder

Apple has spent years diversifying its display supply chain to reduce reliance on individual suppliers. Yet for two of its biggest hardware redesigns in years, its first foldable iPhone and now its first OLED touchscreen MacBook Pro, Samsung Display has emerged as the sole supplier. Apple unveiled the redesigned 14-inch and 16-inch MacBook Pros on Wednesday, introducing touch controls to the Mac for the first time in its 20-year history. The new MacBook Pros feature Apple's PROLED XDR display, w

Six years, three delays and now another wait? South Korea is due to start taxing cryptocurrency income in January, but exchanges, investors and lawmakers are again asking for more time. "Even the experts don't know how we should pay the tax," said Cho Sang-hyuk, who runs the Fireant Crypto community and is campaigning for a delay. "I've paid for consultations with tax accounting firms, but they still tell me we'll have to wait until the rules take effect." Cho filed a petition calling for a two-

The Korean won is saying goodbye to the days when its fortunes were closely tied to the ups and downs of the local stock market. Stock prices and the won's value have typically moved in tandem. Offshore investors hold roughly 40 percent of the main bourse Kospi's total market capitalization. When they sell shares and convert the proceeds into dollars for repatriation, rising dollar demand puts downward pressure on the won. Conversely, when they convert dollars into won to buy Korean shares, dema

South Korea's leading conglomerates are considering a multitrillion-won investment in US nuclear power company Westinghouse Electric, in a move that could give Korean businesses a stronger foothold in America's expanding nuclear energy market. But the proposed investment raises a central question: Will buying a stake in Westinghouse translate into construction and equipment contracts for Korean companies? SK Group, Samsung C&T, Hyundai Engineering & Construction and Doosan Enerbility are reviewi

South Korea has made remarkable gains in keeping people alive. Life expectancy has risen sharply over the past several decades, while deaths related to pregnancy and childbirth have generally declined as access to medical care and obstetric treatment improved. That progress, however, is beginning to reverse. Maternal deaths from direct obstetric complications reached a nine-year high last year, with 27 deaths — up nearly 60 percent from a year earlier, according to Statistics Korea’s 2025 cause-

Four fingers or five? The answer could help determine which humanoid robots make it out of the lab and onto factory floors first. Hyundai Motor Group’s Boston Dynamics has settled on four fingers for its electric Atlas humanoid, concluding that a fifth adds cost and complexity without due benefit for industrial work. Tesla has taken the opposite approach with Optimus, giving it five fingers in pursuit of humanlike dexterity. The contrasting designs reveal two different bets on the humanoid marke

“We will not pass the full (cost) increase on to consumers,” Samsung Electronics co-CEO Roh Tae-moon told reporters in London in July as he unveiled the latest Galaxy foldables. Two weeks later, the Z8 series drew a record 1.44 million preorders in Korea. But by October, Samsung was raising prices on seven-month old Galaxy S26 phones by nearly 150,000 won ($112) in Korea and $100 to $200 in the US. Then came Thursday's earnings. Samsung projected record third-quarter operating profit of 107.4 tr

Naver’s plan to build one of South Korea’s largest AI data centers in Sejong has heavyweight names behind it: Nvidia, global asset manager Brookfield and potentially some of the country’s biggest banks and securities firms. Yet financing a $10 billion AI infrastructure project is proving anything but straightforward. Naver and Brookfield are discussing up to $9 billion in financing for the first phase of an expansion of Naver’s Gak Sejong AI factory, which would increase its capacity to 200 mega