SK Hynix, the world’s second-largest memory chipmaker from South Korea, is weighing options for its Chongqing assets, including bringing in investors to accelerate growth, Bloomberg News reported.
Sources said the company has engaged potential advisers to review their business, with a possible stake sale at about US$3 billion (HK$23.4 billion). Potential bidders include China enquiry funds and industry players, while SK Hynix may remain a minority of equity.
SK Hynix entered the mainland market twenty years ago, and had signed an agreement with Wuxi for their launch of a big scale overseas wafer foundry, and the facilities site in Chongqing has become a key packaging and testing base for the semiconductor’s products.
The company has recently announced plans of spending about 54.3 trillion won (HK$303 billion) to expand chip manufacturing facilities in South Korea, including building a new DRAM plant in Yongin and a NAND wafer fab in Cheongju for meeting surging memory demand.
The company may channel heavy capital expenditure into advanced memory capacity in South Korea, while investing on mainland back‑end sites and expected to operate by bringing in equity from local funds. However, there are no signs yet that a final decision has been made on the Chongqing plant review.
Yu Yan Pui