SEOUL, July 05 (AJP) - South Korea's top chipmakers, Samsung Electronics and SK hynix, are bracing for renewed pressure from Washington to expand their United States manufacturing footprint, days after the two chipmakers committed 800 trillion won, about $522.8 billion, to a sweeping expansion of South Korea's domestic semiconductor base.
Industry sources said Sunday that both companies are weighing how to respond to what they expect will be a fresh push from the administration of United States President Donald Trump, which has used the threat of tariffs to press foreign chipmakers into building on American soil. The concern is that the scale of the Korean announcement, unveiled at a June 29 briefing by President Lee Jae Myung, will invite comparison with the more modest sums the two firms have committed to United States projects.
The lever is a familiar one. In August 2025, Trump said he would impose a tariff of approximately 100 percent on chips and semiconductors, with an exemption for companies building in the United States. The measure has not taken effect, but neither has it been formally withdrawn, leaving it available as a bargaining tool. Memory producers without American fabs would be the most exposed, a category that includes Samsung and SK hynix.
Samsung's largest United States project is in Taylor, Texas, a 37 billion dollar complex built around 2-nanometer foundry production. The company held an equipment move-in ceremony at the Taylor fab in April, closing a nearly two-year delay on the facility Samsung broke ground on in late 2022, and the plant is scheduled to begin operations in the second half of 2026. A Tesla contract signed in July 2025, worth 16.5 billion dollars, runs through 2033 and covers AI5 and AI6 autonomous-driving processors.
SK hynix has committed an estimated 3.87 billion dollars to build an advanced packaging and research facility in West Lafayette, Indiana, its first production site in the United States, dedicated to high bandwidth memory for artificial intelligence products. Mass production is expected in the second half of 2028. The smaller footprint leaves the company more exposed to Washington's demands, and the timing sharpens the point. SK hynix plans to begin trading American depositary receipts on the Nasdaq on July 10, raising up to 29.65 billion dollars through 17.79 million new shares in what would be one of the largest United States listings of the year. Landing that debut smoothly gives the company an added reason to avoid friction with the Trump administration.
Both companies are expected to accelerate rather than reopen their United States plans. For Samsung, that could mean firming up a second Taylor fab already contemplated on the same campus. For SK hynix, industry sources said the question is whether to add memory production in the United States alongside the Indiana packaging base.
The domestic drive that triggered the pressure is on a different scale. Under the June 29 plan, Samsung will invest 400 trillion won in new fabs in the southwestern city of Gwangju and 56 trillion won in high bandwidth memory fabs in Cheonan and Onyang, while SK hynix will invest 400 trillion won in a new production base in the southwest and complete its fourth Yongin fab by 2033, twelve years earlier than the previous 2045 target. The plan is the semiconductor pillar of what the government calls the Three Mega Projects, alongside physical artificial intelligence and AI data centers.
An industry official said the companies were navigating two demands at once. "Samsung and SK have to keep pace with the government's regional development drive while also weathering the pressure from the United States to expand investment there," the official said. "With the midterm elections approaching, the Trump administration is expected to push harder on local investment, and we are watching closely."
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