Samsung’s semiconductor and display businesses are performing very well, and apparently, the company is now preparing for an even higher demand for these types of components. According to a new report from South Korean media outlet The Korea Herald citing a recent announcement from Samsung Electronics, the company intends to make a record 27 trillion won ($23.5 billion) investment by the end of the year in order to increase its production capacity for its semiconductor and display business.
Samsung is one of the largest semiconductor companies in the world and earlier this year the company’s sales of NAND flash memory has been at an all-time high. In fact, earlier in July Samsung’s NAND flash memory market share stood at 42.6%, ensuring the company’s top spot on the market, followed by Toshiba and Micron Technology. Now, according to a new report citing Samsung Electronics, the company wants to invest 13.2 trillion won ($11.5 billion) in its semiconductor business by the end of the year, in order to increase the production capacity of V-NAND flash memory chips used for business servers, large-scale data centers and other areas of the market. In addition, Samsung Electronics will reportedly invest another 10.9 trillion won ($9.5 billion) in order to improve the production capacity of organic light-emitting diode (OLED) displays. Demand for OLED displays is increasing as more smartphone manufacturers seem to make the switch from IPS / LCD technology to OLED, and as one of the world’s largest suppliers of OLED display technologies, Samsung intends to be able and handle the high demand. There have also been rumors suggesting that Apple’s next iPhone – likely to be unveiled in Q3, 2017 – will use OLED display technology from Samsung. Given the usual high demand for new iPhone models, theoretically, Samsung would have to be able and manufacture a few tens of millions of OLED panels for the Cupertino-based giant alone.
It is worth noting that the source mentions a total investment of 27 trillion won ($23.6 billion) by the end of the year, but the 13.2 + 10.9 trillion won investment in the semiconductor and display areas account for only 24.1 trillion won ($21 billion), and the source makes no mention of where the remainder 2.9 trillion won ($2.5 billion) might go. In any case, Samsung Electronics’ Q3 operating profits have reportedly dropped by 30% due to issues with the now-discontinued Samsung Galaxy Note 7, and revenue dropped by 7.4% as well.