Posted Apr 7, 2023, 6:39 AMUpdated on Apr 10, 2023, 3:46 PM
For months, Samsung Electronics had refused to follow its main competitors in a global movement to reduce the production of memory chips. While the other major manufacturers, such as SK Hynix, Micron Technology, Western Digital and Kioxia Holdings were restricting, one by one, their production capacities for DRAM or NAND chips in their factories, the South Korean giant continued to run its semiconductor foundries normally with the hope of holding out until the market recovers. But on Friday, the world number one in the sector announced that the collapse of its profits no longer allowed it to hold this line and that it had to resolve to slow down, in turn, its activity.
In the first quarter of 2023, Samsung Electronics saw, according to its first estimates, its operating profits plunge, year-on-year, by 96% to fall back to 600 billion won (420 million euros), with overall sales contracting 19% to 63 trillion won. If it is not in the red, the largest electronics group on the planet finds itself with profits of a weakness that it had not known since 2009.
