Samsung Electronics won 786 billion 800 million won memory chip investment projects

The world's largest memory chip manufacturer Samsung (Samsung Electronics Co.) announced that the board of directors of the company has approved 786 billion 800 million won investment projects, to upgrade and expand its memory chip production facilities.

The company said in a statement to the watchdog that the measures are aimed at meeting the growing needs of the flash memory chip market.

A spokeswoman for the company said separately that the investment is part of Samsung's capital expenditure budget for next year. She said that Samsung Electronics plans to use these investments to upgrade its flash memory and DRAM production line.

Samsung Electronics has yet to announce its 2006 capital expenditure plan. In 2005, the company expects its capital expenditure will be around 10 trillion and 270 billion won.

Because of the expected NAND flash memory chip demand will be more robust, the 2006 global memory chip manufacturers will continue its strong capital expenditure growth pace, to upgrade their equipment and facilities, but with the DRAM market growth slowed down, the growth rate of all capital spending slowed down.

Merrill Lynch expects Samsung's 2006 capital expenditures will increase 5% to $16 billion 840 million, previously expected to grow by $16 billion 10 million to $26%.

DRAM is widely used in the field of personal computer chip data storage, and NAND flash memory chip -- in the case of power failure can still store data -- is widely used for MP3 players and digital cameras and other consumer electronic products. If calculated according to revenue, Samsung Electronics is the world's largest producer of DRAM and NAND flash memory.