Hanmi Semiconductor vice chairman and CEO Kwak Dong-shin saw a huge valuation margin from his investment in fab equipment maker HPSP made two years ago, TheElec has learned.Kwang and Hanmi Semiconductor together bought 25% of the stock in the private company HPSP. Each spent 37.5 billion won for 12.

Yes Power Technix is expected to start operation of its new fab in Busan this month that will manufacture silicon carbide (SiC) power management IC, parent company SK Holdings said on Tuesday.The four-story fab, which went into construction near the end of 2021, will manufacture 150mm SiC power mana

DB Hitek will for the first time supply its OLED display driver ICs aimed at smartphone panels to Samsung Display, TheElec has learned.DB Hitek will begin supplying the 40-nanometer (nm) DDIs to Samsung Display during the second half of 2023, for use in OLED panels in Samsung smartphones.The company

A Supreme Court ruling made on Thursday on the validity of patents related to silicon carbide (SiC) rings owned by Tokai Carbon Korea (TCK) is expected to disrupt the market in South Korea.The ruling maintained the verdict of the appeals court in October last year and validated a patent related to t

LS Electric is planning to build an electric infrastructure technology center in August somewhere in Central US.The center is expected to house up to 40 staff handling service engineering, maintenance and repair as well as research, the company said.The building of the center will be followed up by

Samsung is expanding the use of automation in its sub-fabs that supply gases and chemicals to fabs, TheElec has learned.The South Korean tech giant is automating the drum logistics systems and installing more automatic clean quick couplers in its sub-fabs, sources said.This was being done to increas

Silicon wafer maker SK Siltron is expected to have posted 2.4 trillion won in revenue last year, TheElec has learned.This will be 20% higher than its 2021 figure and was despite the downturn in the global chip market.High demand for chips during the past five years has spurred SK Siltron’s growth.In

Samsung will be designing and manufacturing the logic chips that Hyundai Motor plans to use for advanced driver assistance (ADAS) and infotainment in its future vehicles, TheElec has learned.This is the first such deal between Samsung and Hyundai Motor, the two largest conglomerates in South Korea.S

Hana Micron is expected to see its sales to SK Hynix more than double this year as its production capacity ramps up from the operation of its new factory in Vietnam.The new factory started operations late last year and offers chip packaging and testing services for chipmakers.SK Hynix accounts for s

SemiFive has secured Doosan Group as an investor in its Series C funding round, TheElec has learned.The system chip design house had aimed to secure 60 billion won in funding during the round but expected secure a total of 70 billion won from investors including Doosan Group.LB Investment and SV Inv

SK Hynix was in talks with equipment maker YEST to procure high-pressure hydrogen annealing equipment, TheElec has learned.The pair were in the alpha test phase of their collaboration, sources said. If the equipment passes it will enter the beta test phase, the final stages before supply, they said.

SK Enpulse, the chip material subsidiary of SK Hynix affiliate SKC, succeeded in developing a blank mask last year and has given samples to potential customers, TheElec has learned.S&S Tech has been the sole vendor of blank masks within South Korea. SK Enpluse has aimed to develop a high-end blank m

Samsung Foundry has been manufacturing Infineon’s MOSFET (metal–oxide–semiconductor field-effect transistor) since last year, TheElec has learned.Samsung had been knocking at the German chip giant’s doorstep for a long time and this effort finally bore fruit last year, sources said. Infineon is the

DB Hitek is planning to split off its fabless chip business to better focus on its main chip foundry business, the company said on Tuesday,This is a reversion of its statements made six months ago where the company said it will not split off its fabless chip business unit after small shareholders vo

South Korean chip startup Morumi is aiming to develop a CPU that can process data in complete parallel.Theoretically, this means the processor can infinitely increase the number of cores, increasing its performance substantially.Morumi CEO JB Lee told TheElec said this makes the company a “first mov

It seems Japan’s trade restriction against South Korea for certain key materials used in advanced tech production that lasted four years is about to end.The South Korean government has agreed to pay compensation to its own citizens who were forced to work in Japanese factories during World Word Two.

Telechips is developing an AI SoC aimed at autonomous driving applications using IP from Sapeon, the AI chip subsidiary of SK Group, TheElec has learned.The chip supports an advanced driver assistance system and will use Sapeon’s AI accelerator IP, sources said.The chip will be manufactured using Sa

Chip and display equipment maker Global Zeus is aiming to expand its robotics business this year, a company executive told TheElec Global Zeus Factory Automation Business ABD BU head Hwang Jae-ik said the company is planning to double the revenue from its robotics business this year.The company is a

South Korea’s import of silicon wafers from China reached US$74.882 million in January, close to the US$77.704 million worth imported from Japan in the same month.The country’s import of silicon wafers from China has continued to increase over the years at a paid pace.In 2020, a total of US$424 mill

South Korean outsourced semiconductor assembly and test (OSAT) companies are seeing the operation rate in their factories drop steeply from the recent downturn of the global chip market.The downturn has caused customer orders to plummet and these companies have operation rates below 50%, sources sai