Samsung Electronics has been given a go ahead by the South Korean government to build a new plant in China to produce high-tech memory chips used in tablets and smartphones, according to the Ministry of Knowledge Economy.
Costing around $4bn, the plant will make NAND flash memory chips mainly for music players and handsets and would have the capacity to make 100,000 wafers per month.
Dow Jones Newswires cited the Samsung spokesman as saying that they are committed to fully cooperate and comply with the government’s request (to ensure the security of their technology) and will try their best to efficiently meet the consumer demand (for flash chips) through this new plant.
Samsung has yet to decide on a site for the plant, which would be its second overseas chip manufacturing site.
Samsung is currently the world leader for NAND flash chips with a share of 39.1%, according to research firm IHS iSuppli.
