South Korea’s SK Hynix has announced plans to invest 21.6 trillion won, approximately $15.07 billion, to build new semiconductor production lines in Yongin by 2030. The large-scale investment aims to meet rising global demand for advanced memory chips, particularly driven by artificial intelligence (AI) applications and data center expansion.
Record-Breaking Financial Performance in 2025
SK Hynix delivered its strongest financial results in history in 2025, reporting:
Revenue of 97.1467 trillion won
Operating profit of 47.2063 trillion won
Operating margin of 49 percent
Net profit of 42.9479 trillion won
Net margin of 44 percent
The company’s revenue increased by more than 30 trillion won compared to 2024, while operating profit nearly doubled year-on-year. In 2024, SK Hynix posted revenue of 66.1930 trillion won and operating profit of 23.4673 trillion won.
Strong Fourth Quarter Momentum
Growth accelerated further in the fourth quarter of 2025, supported by rising demand for high-bandwidth memory and conventional server memory solutions. The company achieved record quarterly results across key financial indicators:
Revenue rose 34 percent to 32.8267 trillion won
Operating profit surged 68 percent to 19.1696 trillion won
Operating margin reached 58 percent quarter-on-quarter
Demand for memory used in AI servers and distributed computing environments significantly boosted performance.
AI-Driven Growth Across DRAM and NAND
SK Hynix emphasized that 2025 marked a milestone in technological leadership as the semiconductor market shifted toward AI-centric demand.
DRAM Segment
In the DRAM business:
High-bandwidth memory revenue more than doubled year-on-year
Mass production of the 1cnm process, the sixth-generation 10-nanometer technology, began
The company developed a 256GB DDR5 RDIMM based on 32Gb fifth-generation 10nm-class 1b DRAM, strengthening its position in high-capacity server modules
The company has been supplying both HBM3E and HBM4 simultaneously, reinforcing customer trust. Large-scale production of HBM4 began after completing mass production preparations in September last year, marking an industry-first milestone.
SK Hynix also plans to expand its AI memory portfolio with solutions such as SOCAMM2 and GDDR7 while accelerating the transition to the 1cnm process.
NAND Business
Despite sluggish demand in the first half of 2025, the NAND segment achieved record annual revenue. The company:
Completed development of 321-layer QLC NAND
Responded to strong second-half demand centered on enterprise SSDs
Plans to strengthen AI data center storage offerings by leveraging Solidigm’s QLC eSSD portfolio
Expanding Global Manufacturing and Packaging Capacity
To address supply-demand imbalances and long-term capacity needs, SK Hynix will:
Maximize production capacity at the M15X fab in Cheongju
Build the first fabrication facility in the Yongin Semiconductor Cluster
Advance construction of packaging facilities in Cheongju and Indiana, U.S.
The integrated expansion of front-end and back-end manufacturing capabilities will enable flexible response to evolving customer requirements, particularly as AI workloads shift from training to inference and distributed architectures expand.
Long-Term Strategy Focused on AI Memory Leadership
As AI adoption accelerates globally, demand is expected to grow not only for high-performance memory such as HBM but also for server DRAM and NAND products. SK Hynix aims to maintain leadership in HBM4 and expand its Custom HBM offerings through closer collaboration with customers and ecosystem partners.
The 21.6 trillion won investment in Yongin underscores the company’s commitment to securing mid-to-long-term semiconductor production capacity while capitalizing on surging AI-driven memory demand.
SHAFANA FAZAL