Samsung announces to invest $8 billion in China chip plant

Samsung Electronics will increase investment at its chip factory in China by $8 billion to boost production of NAND flash memory chips, Chinese media reported.

The South Korean group’s investment comes as the memory market is expected to rebound next year because of limited supplies and rising demand for fifth-generation devices and networks.

Samsung is the world’s largest maker of NAND flash memory chips, which can hold data permanently and are found in mobile devices, memory cards, USB flash drives and solid-state drives.

In 2017, Samsung announced that it would invest $7 billion over three years in its Xi’an plant that produces NAND flash memory chips.

Those investment phases follow an earlier $10.8 billion investment into a testing and packaging plant in Xi’an.

Earlier, Samsung has launched its new flagship phone.

This is the device that sets the tone for the company for the whole year.

Samsung’s six month flagship release cycle affords the company the ability to offer more frequent refreshes, but this first one is really a standard setter for both the company and the industry at large.

A February 18 launch date has been floated for the next flagship.

Samsung has broken away from MWC — and big tech shows in general — for its biggest announcements.

Doing so puts the spotlight on its own devices and beats the MWC news glut for a few weeks. Likely available for the devices will begin the following month.

The recently announced Snapdragon 865 will be powering the device in a number of markets, making the S11 among the first devices to launch with the latest flagship SoC.

A recent report also suggests that the configuration will be available in even more markets, including, potentially its native South Korea. Standardized 5G seems possible across the board, though that’s likely going to mean an even more prohibitively expensive starting price.