SEOUL, March 11 (AJP) - Shares of Samsung Electronics headed north as investors welcomed the South Korean tech behemoth’s record spending — amounting to nearly a third of last year’s revenue of over $200 billion — to advance chipmaking capabilities in the AI-driven era while sharing the memory boom with shareholders.
According to its 2025 business report disclosed Tuesday, the company invested a record 37.7 trillion won ($28.3 billion) in research and development last year and set aside 16 trillion won to retire around 87 million treasury shares during the first half.
As of 10:00 a.m. Wednesday, shares were up 2.55 percent at 192,500.
The 2025 R&D spending marked a 7.8 percent increase from 2024, while capital expenditure on semiconductor and display facilities rose to 52.7 trillion won, about 5 trillion won more than initially planned.
Samsung said the massive investment was aimed at preemptively addressing demand for next-generation semiconductors such as High Bandwidth Memory (HBM) and high-capacity DDR5, key components powering artificial intelligence data centers.
The company recently began mass production of HBM4 base dies and plans to expand supply of HBM4 this year to meet surging demand from major global technology firms. Notably, Alphabet has joined Samsung’s top five customers amid the rapid expansion of AI infrastructure investments by big tech companies.
Samsung also reported strong financial performance last year.
Annual revenue reached 333.61 trillion won, up 10.9 percent from a year earlier, while operating profit jumped 33.2 percent to 43.6 trillion won. Revenue exceeded 330 trillion won for the first time, marking the company’s highest annual sales on record.
Shareholder returns are also being strengthened. Samsung plans to cancel about 87 million treasury shares, valued at roughly 16 trillion won based on the March 10 closing price, as part of efforts to enhance shareholder value.
The semiconductor recovery and improved earnings also lifted employee compensation. The average annual salary rose 21.5 percent to a record 158 million won last year, compared with 130 million won in 2024.
To promote longer-term performance-based management, the company granted 35.29 million performance share units (PSUs) to around 128,000 employees.
As of the end of last year, Samsung’s domestic workforce stood at 128,881, with the average tenure rising to 13.7 years. The company said it plans to continue creating jobs for young people through its traditional open recruitment program in the first half of the year.
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