SK hynix Inc.’s Icheon campus in Gyeonggi Province. (Yonhap)
SEOUL, March 31 (Korea Bizwire) — SK hynix Inc.’s revenue from its non-memory chip business spiked last year, its business report showed Tuesday, as South Korea’s No. 2 chipmaker looks to expand its presence beyond the memory semiconductor industry.
SK hynix’s non-memory chip business logged sales of 1.6 trillion won (US$1.3 billion) in 2019, more than double the 650 billion won recorded in 2018.
Excluding sales of its procurement outsourcing affiliate, Happy Narae, SK hynix’s sales from the non-memory chip business increased more than 40 percent on-year in 2019, according to the company.
In contrast, the company’s mainstay memory chip sector slumped last year.
Revenue from DRAM business plunged 37 percent on-year to 20.3 trillion won last year, while revenue from NAND flash business dropped 31 percent on-year to 5.1 trillion won.
SK hynix said it plans to reinforce its competitiveness in the complementary metal-oxide-semiconductor (CMOS) image sensor market.
The company recently rebranded its CMOS image sensor products under the name Black Pearl. It plans to introduce a 48-megapixel product using 0.8-micrometer technology in the second half of the year.
According to data from market researcher TSR, SK hynix’s share of the CMOS image sensor market last year was only about 2 percent, far behind industry leaders Sony Corp. and Samsung Electronics Co. with 48 percent and 21 percent, respectively.
SK hynix is also trying to boost its presence in the foundry sector. The company’s foundry joint venture with China’s Wuxi Industry Development Group aims to start volume production within this year.
It also joined the acquisition of local chipmaker MagnaChip Semiconductor Corp.’s foundry business with other investors.
(Yonhap)
