April 24, 2024

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[THE INVESTOR] SK hynix posted a record operating profit of 3.74 trillion won (US$3.30 billion) in the third quarter, up 415 percent from a year earlier, according to its regulatory filing on Oct. 26.

The chipmake’s revenue came in at 8.1 trillion won, up 91 percent on-year.

The company attributed the price hike of DRAM to the profit surge. The shipment volume and average sale price of the firm’s DRAM chips rose 21 percent and 23 percent, respectively, from the previous quarter. The shipments of NAND flash memory chips increased 16 percent from the previous quarter, but the ASP of the chips dropped 3 percent.

SK hynix forecast its chip business would continue to ride momentum in the fourth quarter thanks to growth of the cloud business sector, which needs a large number of memory and storage chips, and the rising demand for semiconductors in the high-end smartphone segment.

“The DRAM business is expected to grow 20 percent, in terms of bit growth, next year,” said an official from the chip company during a conference call, forecasting that the NAND business will grow 30 percent in the same period.

Bit growth is a term that reflects the production increase of chips based on the smallest data unit, bit.

The company also said construction of the second floor of the M14 cleanroom in Cheongju, North Chungcheong Province, is halfway complete and NAND flash memory chips are already being manufactured there.

“The construction will be completed by early December this year and necessary tools will be installed by then,” the SK hynix official during the conference call.

The company plans to invest a total of 9.6 trillion won to beef up the chip manufacturing infrastructure by the year-end.

By Kim Young-won (wone0102@heraldcorp.com)