ISTANBUL
South Korean chipmaker SK hynix said Friday it will invest about 54 trillion won ($38.1 billion) to build two new memory chip manufacturing plants as demand for artificial intelligence-related memory continues to grow.
The company said it approved an investment of $24.8 billion in a new fabrication plant, known as Y2, in Yongin and $13.47 billion in another facility, M17, in Cheongju.
The investments are aimed at expanding SK hynix’s capacity for both DRAM and NAND memory amid rapidly growing demand driven by AI infrastructure.
The Yongin Y2 plant, the second of four fabs planned for the Yongin Semiconductor Cluster, will serve as a production base for high-bandwidth memory (HBM) and other next-generation DRAM products.
Construction is scheduled to begin in July 2027, with the first cleanroom expected to open in June 2029.
The Cheongju M17 facility, meanwhile, will focus on NAND memory, where SK hynix said demand is rising rapidly, particularly for enterprise solid-state drives used in AI services.
Construction of M17 is expected to start in February 2027, with its first cleanroom scheduled to open in December 2028.
SK hynix said market researcher Omdia expects demand for both DRAM and NAND to grow at a compound annual rate of 19% through 2030.
The company said it sees the expansion in memory demand not as a temporary market cycle but as a structural shift as memory becomes increasingly important to AI performance.
“In the AI era, technological competitiveness alone is not enough and the ability to supply the required volume at the exact moment customers need it is the ultimate competitive advantage,” the company said.
The projects form part of SK hynix’s broader investment plan, which includes 600 trillion won for the Yongin Semiconductor Cluster and 100 trillion won to expand its Cheongju production base.
