Samsung to set up Rs1,588-cr plant in TN

Chennai: South Korean tech giant Samsung will set up a compressor plant at an outlay of Rs 1,588 crore near here, a senior group official said on Tuesday. Spread over 22 acres, the new plant will have a capacity to make eight million units per year.

The compressors produced at the new plant will be used for the refrigerators made by the company and also for exports, said Ken Kang, President and CEO, Samsung Southwest Asia said. Samsung India has signed a Memorandum of Understanding with Tamil Nadu government.

Speaking on the occasion, Tamil Nadu Chief Minister MK Stalin welcoming the fresh investment also requested Samsung to set up a semi-conductor plant in the state. He said Samsung's total investment in Tamil Nadu has gone up to about Rs 1,800 crore till date.

Meanwhile, Samsung Electronics expanded its share of the global foundry market in the fourth quarter, slightly narrowing down the gap with the industry's leader TSMC.

The South Korean chipmaker's share rose 1.1 percentage points to reach 18.3 per cent in the October-December period, according to market analyst firm TrendForce, while the dominant market player Taiwan's TSMC shed 1 per cent to 52.1 per cent.

Samsung's foundry business grew 15.3 per cent from the previous quarter, compared with TSMC's 5.8 per cent on-quarter growth.

The report said Samsung was the only contract chip manufacturer among the industry's top five players to increase its market share on-year in the fourth quarter, reports Yonhap news agency.

TrendForce attributed Samsung's growth to "the gradual completion of new advanced 5/4nm process capacity and the mass production of new flagship products from major client Qualcomm."

It said, however, the slower ramp-up of advanced process capacity is expected to erode overall profitability for Samsung, and one of its top priorities should be "improving advanced process capacity and yield."

During a conference call following the fourth-quarter earnings result in late January, Samsung said its foundry business logged record-high revenue in the quarter, without providing detailed figures.