To Offset Slowdown in Memory Sector
Samsung Electronics is stepping up efforts to strengthen its non-memory semiconductor business. The company is seeking to strengthen the profit structure of the non-memory business by raising its competitiveness to the level of its world-leading semiconductor business.
The Korean tech giant is accelerating technology development for non-memory products such as system semiconductors, foundry products, and logic ICs.
Samsung announced recently that it has signed a contract with global automobile manufacturer Audi to supply automobile semiconductors from 2021. It launched the automotive semiconductor brand Exynos Auto in October last year. Industry analysts expect the automotive semiconductor market to grow significantly amid growing demand for electric vehicles and the imminent launch of autonomous vehicles.
In the foundry sector, Samsung Electronics has made big achievements by strengthening its competitiveness. While Taiwanese foundry company TSMC accounts for about half of the global foundry market, Samsung Electronics ranked second in the market last year by attaining sales of about US$10 billion. Samsung’s foundry business is expected to continue to grow with the increased demand for high-performance semiconductors due to the development of the technologies that are shaping the Fourth Industrial Revolution industry, such as big data and artificial intelligence (AI).
Samsung Electronics is pushing hard to strengthen its competitiveness in the non-memory semiconductor business as growth of the memory semiconductor market is expected to slow down this year. In the mid- to long-term, there is a high possibility a supply glut as Chinese companies are jumping into the memory semiconductor market.
World Semiconductor Trade Statistics (WSTS) forecast in its recent report that the size of the memory semiconductor market will decline by 0.3% this year to US$164.5 billion (about 184 trillion won).
On the other hand, the overall semiconductor market is expected to grow by 2.6% despite the decline in the memory sector. This is due to the continuous growth of the non-memory semiconductor sector.