Samsung Electronics, SK Hynix Shares Soar On OpenAI's Korean Data Center Push

Core Insights - OpenAI has formed strategic partnerships with Samsung Group, SK Group, and South Korea's Ministry of Science and ICT to support the $500 billion Stargate initiative aimed at developing AI data center infrastructure [3][6][12] - Samsung Electronics and SK Hynix's stock prices surged to record levels following the announcement of their collaboration with OpenAI [2][4] Group 1: Partnerships and Collaborations - The partnerships involve providing advanced memory chips for Stargate operations and developing AI data centers in South Korea, including key companies from both Samsung and SK [5][9] - SK Telecom plans to collaborate with OpenAI to build an AI data center in the southwest region of South Korea as part of "Stargate Korea" [9] Group 2: Market Demand and Supply - OpenAI's memory demand is projected to reach up to 900,000 DRAM wafers per month, which is more than double the current HBM industry capacity, highlighting the significant semiconductor demand driven by the Stargate project [8] - SK Hynix is the main supplier of HBM chips to Nvidia, and both SK Hynix and Samsung supply HBM chips to Broadcom for custom AI chips for OpenAI [7] Group 3: National Ambitions and Industry Context - South Korea aims to become one of the world's top three nations in AI by 2027, with national AI and semiconductor manufacturing ambitions being a key focus for the current administration [13] - Other South Korean companies, such as Kakao, are also investing in AI infrastructure, with Kakao planning to invest approximately 600 billion won to build an AI data center [14]