South Korea Ties Up with US AI Industry Chain! Samsung, SK Hynix Sign $95 Billion Chip Deals with Nvidia, Broadcom, and Others

South Korea is rapidly establishing itself as a core player in the global artificial intelligence supply chain through unprecedented-scale capital and capacity cooperation with major American tech giants, marking a deep strategic alignment between the two countries in cutting-edge technology industries.

According to Reuters, South Korean presidential advisor Kim Yong-beom revealed at a press conference on Saturday that Samsung Electronics and SK Hynix will sign memory chip supply deals with major U.S. technology companies, including Nvidia, with a total value reaching $950 billion. Among them, SK Hynix will provide U.S. companies with long-term memory chips worth $750 billion, while Samsung Electronics will supply chips worth $200 billion to Broadcom.

Meanwhile, Nvidia and SK Group further announced an AI infrastructure plan valued at over $500 billion. These historic, massive orders and infrastructure investments will not only directly alleviate the current supply chain bottlenecks for High Bandwidth Memory (HBM), but also secure long-term and highly visible revenue expectations for South Korean chipmakers, reshaping the capacity and investment landscape of the global semiconductor market.

This commercial breakthrough is closely tied to South Korean high-level political initiatives. Against the backdrop of AI compute demand far outstripping global supply, South Korean President Lee Jae-myung formally issued the "San Francisco AI Declaration". This multinational strategic alignment directly ensures the stable supply of critical hardware for U.S. tech companies and puts South Korea’s semiconductor manufacturing base at the forefront of global AI compute expansion.

Massive Chip Orders Secure Long-term Supply

Ensuring the stability of underlying compute hardware supply is at the heart of this collaboration. According to Reuters, the memory chip supply agreements, worth up to $950 billion, will build a long-term moat of capacity for U.S. tech giants. As Nvidia’s largest memory chip supplier, SK Hynix plays a crucial role in this cooperation.

Meanwhile, the collaboration between Samsung Electronics and Broadcom far exceeds a traditional supply relationship. According to Bloomberg, the two parties have signed a strategic Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) to cooperate across memory chips and wafer foundries over the next five years (until 2030), in a deal valued at over $200 billion.

Specifically, in the memory business, Samsung will provide advanced memory solutions for Broadcom’s next-generation AI accelerators; in wafer foundries, the two sides will jointly develop Broadcom products using Samsung's 2nm and below advanced process technologies, including wireless broadband communication chips. The partnership will also extend to 2.3D and 2.5D advanced packaging technologies based on Samsung's 2nm process to support higher performance and lower power AI and networking chips.

Reports indicate that the long-term agreement between SK Hynix and Nvidia aims to ensure the supply of advanced memory chips, with both parties jointly developing High Bandwidth Memory (HBM) for AI training, AI agents, and Physical AI applications. HBM stacks multiple memory chips to deliver the data transmission speeds required by advanced AI processors and has become a key limiting factor in the current AI supply chain.

With the continued growth in demand for AI servers, robots, and supercomputers, SK Hynix plans to double its wafer capacity by 2030 to further enhance HBM supply capabilities and to synchronize future memory chip production more closely with Nvidia’s chip development roadmap.

Over $500 Billion Reshaping AI Infrastructure

In addition to securing underlying chip supply, large-scale data center construction has become another focus of investment.

According to reports, the plan by Nvidia and SK Group, worth over $500 billion, includes large-scale AI data center construction and next-generation HBM development. SK Telecom will build a 2-gigawatt capacity AI data center in South Korea, with the first project using Nvidia’s Vera Rubin platform and SK Hynix’s HBM4 memory.

The first facility of this "AI factory" is expected to become operational in 2027 (that is, next year). This two-gigawatt plan builds on SK Telecom’s previous commitment to gigawatt-level AI cloud infrastructure, with potential funding sources including global technology companies, overseas capital, and other strategic partners.

Additionally, Nvidia is continuously expanding its investment landscape in South Korea. According to Bloomberg, Nvidia announced late Friday that it will invest $1 billion in Naver to support the construction of an AI data center in South Korea. This injection of capital will allow Naver to scale up the Nvidia AI compute platform-based data center to more than triple its previous size.

The "San Francisco AI Declaration" Drives a National-level Strategic Alignment

Behind the comprehensive industry alliance is a national-level strategic plan by South Korea to become a global AI powerhouse.

On July 24, South Korean President Lee Jae-myung presided over a high-level AI summit in San Francisco, bringing together leading global AI developers and top Korean business leaders. During the summit, Lee Jae-myung officially issued the "San Francisco AI Declaration," clarifying the core vision of Korea-U.S. AI technology cooperation and pledging to open its "vibrant AI ecosystem" to the global market.

The summit’s lineup highlighted the strategic importance of this cooperation. Prior to the summit, Lee Jae-myung met with Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang, OpenAI CEO Sam Altman, Anthropic CEO Dario Amodei, and Broadcom CEO Hock Tan.

Meanwhile, representing Korean industry at the summit were Samsung Electronics Executive Chairman Jay Y. Lee, SK Group Chairman Chey Tae-won, Hyundai Motor Group Executive Chairman Euisun Chung, and Naver founder Lee Hae-jin.

According to Bloomberg, Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang highly praised the partnership during an interview. He stated that now is the "golden age for South Korea," with the country’s semiconductor industry and industrial system booming simultaneously, and emphasized that Korea is a "nation capable of helping the world build AI infrastructure."