In the third quarter of this year, Samsung Electronics reclaimed its position as the number one player in the global memory market, surpassing SK Hynix. This marks a return to the top spot just one quarter after ceding the lead in global memory semiconductor sales to SK Hynix, which had dominated the high-bandwidth memory (HBM) market in the second quarter of this year.
According to global market research firm Counterpoint Research on October 14, Samsung Electronics posted sales of $19.4 billion (approximately 27.67 trillion won) in the overall memory market, including DRAM and NAND flash, in the third quarter. SK Hynix recorded $17.5 billion (about 24.96 trillion won) in sales during the same period. Compared to the previous quarter, sales increased by 25% for Samsung Electronics and 13% for SK Hynix, respectively.
Counterpoint Research analyzed, "Samsung Electronics regained the top spot thanks to strong demand for general-purpose DRAM and NAND. Although HBM performance was sluggish this year, significant growth is expected to begin next year, driven by HBM3E (5th generation) and HBM4 (6th generation)."
With this recovery trend, Counterpoint Research forecasts that Samsung will maintain its number one position in the memory market in the fourth quarter as well. However, it appears that Samsung did not reclaim the top spot in DRAM alone in the third quarter, but rather in the overall memory market excluding NAND.
HBM market share is also expected to expand. As Samsung Electronics is virtually the exclusive supplier of HBM3E 12-layer chips to AMD, and with AMD signing a large-scale GPU supply contract with OpenAI, an increase in HBM shipments is anticipated.
Additionally, while HBM3E supply to Nvidia is imminent, qualification processes for HBM4 supply are reportedly progressing smoothly. As the semiconductor business recovers, performance has also rebounded significantly.
In the third quarter of this year, Samsung Electronics' revenue and operating profit were provisionally tallied at 86 trillion won and 12.1 trillion won, respectively. The securities industry estimates that the Device Solutions (DS) division, which is responsible for semiconductors, achieved an operating profit in the upper 5 trillion won range. In particular, it is widely expected that operating profit from DRAM alone exceeded 6 trillion won.
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