South Korea risks staying without chipping through the US and China's sanction war

Korean companies SK Hynix and Samsung have been restricted by the US Ministry of Commodity, although their products depend on Apple, Microsoft and Google. South Korea's economy is very dependent on the semiconductor industry, which today is under a blow through the technological war between Washington and Beijing, SCMP reports.

The South Korean Sk Hynix chip manufacturer, located halfway between Seoul and Beijing, has been drawn into a complex US restriction network imposed on China technosector in order to cut the latter access to equipment to create advanced chips. The SK Hynix plant in Dalyan, which the company purchased at Intel, specializes in the 3D Nand flash memory (used in smartphones and other devices-ed.

), Which accounts for the growing part of the income of the entire company, of which about 27%- to a Chinese enterprise. Given DRAM, the total proportion of South Korea in the world is over 60%. The company has invested 9 billion US dollars to strengthen capacity and occupy a strong place in the world market. But instead, the new building of the plant is empty because the company cannot buy lithographic equipment because of US sanctions that touched it.

Last fall, the United States provided SK Hynix and Samsung Electronics permission to import equipment for their businesses located in China. States understand that the chips from these manufacturers will need Apple, Microsoft, Google, Alphabet. For example, according to Bloomberg, Apple receives 20% of China's income and is the largest SK Hynix and Samsung client. However, no one has guaranteed the South Korean companies that this permission will be "forever".

"SK Hynix plant in Dalyan - a vivid example of a difficult situation in South Korean chips as a result of US restrictions," said analyst Masakhiro Wakasuhi with Bloomberg Intelligence. - Even with the latest, there is no sensation in the US. Given uncertainty about the US presidential elections and US policy. " According to the International Monetary Fund, South Korea may be most affected by the US and China's sanction war.

"Korea has to balance between the US and the PRC," says Troy Stanharon, director of the Korean Economic Institute. "Korea is in the forefront of critical technologies, both semiconductor and battery, which create opportunities for growth of the economy, but are also vulnerable. " So far, SK Hynix and Samsung can import China to the production of chips from the United States, following the restrictions on the most advanced double -use technologies, although companies.

But companies are still prohibited from expanding the production of advanced chips in the China's territory by more than 5% for 10 years. Selling a plant in Dalyan is also not an option. Washington is unlikely to allow Chinese buyers, and SK Hynix itself refutes rumors about sale.

Since then, as the US Ministry of Commodity has published a list of restrictions on the use of advanced American chip technologies, SK Hynix and Samsung have increased the cost of lobbyists in the US, trying to get weakening to lose its production capacity. Companies and Korean officials are trying to convince the White House that Hynix products from Dalyan do not carry any risks.

Despite the weakening of the sanctions for Chinese enterprises SK Hynix and Samsung, the prospects of other South Korean chips that depend on trade with the PRC are unclear. It all depends on the US presidential election, according to the material.

"Although China is still the largest trading partner of South Korea, according to data published in early 2024, monthly exports to the United States have exceeded exports to China for the first As politicians and companies are changing strategies to cope with the sanction war and its consequences, "the material authors summed up. Earlier, Focus wrote that the company with the PRC made a fake UAV type Shahd-136 and sold it on Alibaba.