[Infostock Daily=Senior Reporter Kim Jong-hyo] While major decisions have been delayed due to the absence of Vice Chairman Lee Jae-yong, the semiconductor foundry division of Samsung Electronics is facing challenges.
The company has not been successful in achieving the yield of the system LSI semiconductor pre-processing in production.
According to the sources and information collected by Infostock Daily, Samsung Electronic foundry is not exceeding the target yield of the next-generation 5-nano semiconductor in production.
An official familiar with the internal affairs of Samsung Electronics said, "The yield of 5-nano system semiconductor pre-process does not exceed 50%. Our team is making all-out efforts to obtain the yield, but we are not making much progress."
The official said, "the Samsung Semiconductor Research Institute has achieved the target yield by applying a groundbreaking production method. As an alternative, proposals to adopt a new production method are made, but the executive decision is being delayed."
In general, DRAM target yield is more than 90%, but the target yield of system LSI is in seventies.
Even if the foundry business has the orders at record level, the profit is declining as production increases due to increase of production costs driven by the low yield rates.
The low yield is also affecting the overall profits of the division, and It raises the possibility of a loss in the first quarter.
Samsung Electronics stated, "There is no problem with the yield of the 5-nano system LSI pre-process."
Senior Reporter Kim Jong-hyo kei1000@infostock.com
