Strong projections for the artificial intelligence chip market's explosive growth are motivating South Korea's top semiconductor businesses to increase their investments in production facilities.
While SK Hynix has just started work on a new back-end processing facility, Samsung Electronics is reevaluating plans to resume chip manufacturing plant construction in Korea.
There are four stages to Pyeongtaek Campus Line 4, the company's fourth significant semiconductor factory on the property.
According to reports, work orders for Phases 2 and 4 have just been issued, while Phases 1 and 3 are almost finished. Full-scale building is anticipated to begin in two to three months.
Two sections of the P4 plant that were originally intended for foundry manufacture are now anticipated to be transformed into DRAM production lines. Using a 10-nanometer technique, which Samsung has confirmed it has successfully built for next-generation high bandwidth memory chips, these will produce sixth-generation 1c DRAM.
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Samsung's commitment to catching up to rivals and obtaining fresh orders for HBM chips was demonstrated last week when Vice Chair Jun Young-hyun, who leads the company's semiconductor division, traveled to the US and spoke with Nvidia.
It is anticipated that Phase 4 will produce 80,000 wafers per month, or 40 percent of P4's 200,000 12-inch wafer capability.
According to reports, Samsung is also thinking about resuming building on P5, its fifth factory at the Pyeongtaek Campus. P5 construction was put on hold early last year after starting in 2023.
The P5 facility, which is expected to cost more than 30 trillion won, is intended to be a sophisticated fabrication plant for the production of DRAM, NAND flash, and foundry products.
SK Hynix is reportedly increasing its production capacity as well. Later this year, the chipmaker is anticipated to finish building its new M15X factory in Cheongju. With a projected monthly capacity of about 90,000 wafers, this facility will start manufacturing fifth-generation 10nm-class DRAM chips for next-generation HBM4 products.
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Furthermore, "P&T 7," a new back-end production facility in Cheongju, is being invested in by SK Hynix. In order to improve advanced chips' performance and energy efficiency, the site will improve its packaging capabilities.
The need for HBM chips, which are essential for powering AI computers, is predicted to keep the DRAM market robust in the second half of the year.