Sure enough, Samsung and Hynix, which were "exempted" by the United States, began to regain their vitality.
In the past, Samsung and Hynix, as the world's two largest memory chip manufacturers, accounted for more than 7% of the global memory chip market, of which more than 60% of the revenue was contributed by China.
Taking Samsung as an example, backed by the Chinese market, Samsung has been able to rank first in the world as the world's largest memory chip manufacturer for ten consecutive years, with an annual revenue of 345.7 billion at its peak. However, when the United States escalated its control over China, it chose to abandon the mainland market, and openly shouted that "without the mainland market, we would still be the first in the world."
Samsung's withdrawal dealt a major blow to Kirin's chip production capacity, and it was forced to "survive with a broken arm", and its market share once fell to 8%. But at the same time, Samsung, which gave up the mainland market, began to gradually get out of its own control.
After losing the blessing of China's mainland market, Samsung ushered in an "avalanche" landslide that had not been seen in 14 years, with nearly half of the production lines shut down, and the value of the overstocked chips reached 460 billion. It was only at this time that Samsung finally realized that it could not do without the Chinese market at all.
As a result, Samsung, which has woken up, began its own path back to the Chinese market, and obtaining the "exemption from operating in China" from the United States is the first step.
Not long ago, according to Korean media news, Samsung and Hynix obtained the approval of the United States, extending the "permanent operation exemption" of these two companies in the Chinese market, which means that Samsung and Hynix can continue to expand their chip production capacity in China in the future and continue to ship to the Chinese market.
We don't know what the price these two companies paid for the "immunity", but in terms of practical results, it is undoubtedly worth it.
According to the data of the Ministry of Commerce of South Korea, the export volume of South Korea's core in November was 66.5 billion, a year-on-year increase of 129%, before that, South Korea's chip exports have been in a row for 15 consecutive months**.
Although the growth rate is not large, and the shipment of chips to China is only 7.5 billion, it is of "turning significance" for the current South Korean side. However, in the face of Samsung and Hynix's active overtures, we should be more sober today.
As the people called for at the beginning: we must give up any illusions about all foreign companies as soon as possible, because the iron still needs to be hard. Before mastering enough core technologies, the return of Samsung and Hynix to the Chinese market is not good news for us.
Because of the return of these foreign companies, it will not only oppress the development of China's local chip manufacturers, but also the lack of core technology, resulting in us still having no say in the market. If this problem cannot be solved, it is equivalent to a sword hanging high above our heads at all times.
It is undeniable that in recent years, China's semiconductor industry has developed very rapidly, especially in the field of memory chips, many local enterprises such as Yangtze River Storage, with strong strength, have emerged, but at the same time, we must also admit that there is a big gap between us and the world's advanced level.
Some insiders speculate that the reason why the United States agreed to extend the "exemption period for operating in the Chinese market" for Samsung and Hynix cannot be ruled out as wanting to seize China's relevant market share through the advanced products of foreign companies, thereby compressing the development space of our local enterprises and hindering the development of China's technology in related fields.
The more we are in this situation, the more we should always stay sober and give up any illusions about foreign companies as soon as possible.