Samsung to Invest Record $73 Billion in AI Chip Comeback Bid

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Samsung to Invest Record $73 Billion in AI Chip Comeback Bid.

deals & business :: 8hrs ago :: source - bloomberg

By Yoolim Lee

(Bloomberg) -- Samsung Electronics Co. plans to spend more than 110 trillion won ($73.3 billion) on chip capacity expansion and research this year, devoting a record amount of capital toward an effort to seize the lead in AI semiconductors.

Korea’s largest company is hiking investment 22% in 2026 to try and retake the lead in AI chips from SK Hynix Inc., which has become the dominant provider of high-bandwidth memory to Nvidia Corp. The total outlay surpasses the roughly $50 billion that Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co. is setting aside for capex this year.

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The decision reflects a strategic shift toward AI-driven demand. At the company’s annual general meeting on Wednesday, co-CEO Jun Young-hyun described how the rise of agentic AI is fueling an explosive surge in orders — not just for high-bandwidth memory, but also for server-grade storage. Consequently, the company will focus heavily on next-generation AI chips and advanced foundry processes.

The planned investment represents more than half of Samsung’s projected operating profit for the year. Analysts expect the company’s operating profit to more than quadruple to a record 202.6 trillion won this year, fueled by its early lead in the cutting-edge HBM4 market.

Samsung reclaimed its technical lead early this year by becoming the first company to commercially ship HBM4 to customers, overcoming years of struggles and qualification delays that allowed rival SK Hynix to dominate one of the most lucrative fields in the global semiconductor market.

Its fortunes rose further at Nvidia’s GTC event earlier this month with the debut of its next-generation HBM4E chip. The Suwon-based company also won a ringing endorsement from Nvidia boss Jensen Huang, who revealed that Samsung’s advanced 4-nanometer technology will be used to manufacture Groq 3 processors. A deepening partnership with Nvidia together with a new deal to supply HBM4 chips to Advanced Micro Devices Inc. is cementing Samsung’s role as a pivotal player in the AI hardware ecosystem.

Related Story: Samsung Claims Lead in Race to Ship AI Chips to Nvidia

The efforts by Samsung to expand capacity, meawhile, may go some way toward resolving a global deficit of traditional memory that’s hindering production across many industries.

Samsung, SK Hynix and Micron Technology Inc. are enjoying an unprecedented surge in demand for the high-end memory essential to Nvidia accelerators. But the shift in production is in turn fomenting a historic shortage of conventional memory chips that go into most modern devices from cars to smartphones.

That deficit is beginning to hammer profits, derail corporate plans and inflate price tags on everything from laptops and smartphones to cars and data centers — and many expect the crunch to worsen before it improves. SK Hynix is preparing to outline measures to help stabilize prices, SK Group Chairman Chey Tae-won said this week, without elaborating.

Chey said he expected that global shortage to persist another four to five years because of endemic constraints in semiconductor production.

--With assistance from Shinhye Kang.

(Updates with context on competition from fourth paragraph.)