Samsung Electronics Co shares jumped 4.47 percent yesterday after reports it has won approval from Nvidia Corp for the use of advanced high-bandwidth memory (HBM) chips, which marks a breakthrough for the South Korean technology leader.
The stock closed at 83,500 won in Seoul, the highest since July 31 last year. Yesterday’s gain comes after local media, including the Korea Economic Daily, reported that Samsung’s 12-layer HBM3E product recently passed Nvidia’s qualification tests.
That clears the components for use in the artificial intelligence (AI) accelerators essential to the training of AI models from ChatGPT to DeepSeek (深度求索), and finally allows Samsung to compete with SK Hynix Inc with higher-end products.
Photo: AFP
Samsung has made headway with its latest generations of chips and should gain final certification on HBM3E from Nvidia soon, people familiar with the matter said.
The South Korean company has redoubled efforts this year to catch up with local rival SK Hynix and Micron Technology Inc of the US in the provision of HBM, which is designed to work in tandem with the powerful Nvidia chips that Meta Platforms Inc and OpenAI employ to train and operate AI services.
Samsung shares are up about 20 percent this month on expectations that commodity memory chips — where Samsung still leads — would face supply shortages next year, thanks to AI demand. Global funds bought more than US$2 billion worth of Samsung this month.
While reports of Samsung passing Nvidia’s tests have cropped up this year, investors are putting more stock in such talk, 19 months after the development of the product and after several delays.
The company has also entered other areas of the chip market. In July, a surprise US$16.5 billion chipmaking deal with Tesla Inc breathed new life into a foundry or contract-manufacturing business all but written off by many investors.
Samsung’s shipment volumes to Nvidia should remain small this year as Nvidia’s orders have already been filled by rivals SK Hynix and Micron. Yet that is still a big step for Samsung, whose HBM delays have raised questions around its technology leadership. While investors have generally low expectations after those hiccups, Nvidia’s approval would still be a positive for Samsung, Goldman Sachs Group Inc analysts wrote.
If confirmed, “it would be a clear indication that the company is able to meet the highest standard in the HBM industry,” Goldman Sachs analyst Giuni Lee said. It “therefore could also mean that the probability for HBM4 qualification from the same customer could rise.”
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