Samsung reports record quarterly profits on AI boom

South Korean technology giant Samsung Electronics on Thursday posted a more than 780% leap in third-quarter operating profit from a year earlier, buoyed by booming demand for AI semiconductors.

The company is the world’s largest maker of memory chips – components now in huge demand as advanced types are snapped up for use in data centres powering artificial intelligence.

Samsung posted July-September operating profit at 107.4 trillion won (US$80.5 billion) – up 783.1% on-year, the company said in a regulatory filing.

It marked the first time any tech company had recorded quarterly operating profit of more than 100 trillion won, the firm said.

Net profit jumped 514.6% from last year to 75.1 trillion won, while sales reached 195.2 trillion won.

However, the results fell short of market expectations, with a Bloomberg survey of economists having predicted quarterly operating profit of 108.5 trillion won and net profit of 89.4 trillion won.

Samsung shares were were down more than 2.4% in Seoul on Thursday morning.

The global race to build AI data centres has turbocharged the fortunes of Samsung and its rivals, despite concerns that the sector may be overvalued.

The company’s memory business achieved “another record-breaking quarter by managing its product mix, with a focus on AI products, amid capacity constraints,” Samsung said in a statement.

“Strong demand momentum for servers led to higher market prices across all applications,” it said.