The investment plan, announced on June 29 by President Lee Jae Myung together with the chairmen of Samsung and SK Hynix, commits a combined 800 trillion won (US$518 billion) to develop a semiconductor manufacturing hub in South Korea’s southwest. Samsung Chairman Lee Jae‑yong said Samsung’s new facilities will be built in the city of Gwangju.

Each company will construct two fabrication plants in the southwest, adding to their existing manufacturing complexes in Gyeonggi Province, for a total of four new memory‑chip‑making plants, according to hindustantimes.com. An additional 81 trillion won (US$53 billion) will be allocated for chip‑packaging facilities, also reported by hindustantimes.com. SK Hynix and Samsung each will invest about 400 trillion won (roughly US$260 billion) in the new hub, per hindustantimes.com.

The plan aims to secure supplies of advanced memory chips needed for AI data centres and computing infrastructure, according to scmp, and to ease pressure on the Seoul metropolitan area by creating a second major chipmaking base in the southwest, also cited by scmp. The government is pushing to spread industrial investment and the AI boom to regions outside the Seoul metropolitan area, according to other sources.

Samsung and SK Hynix together produce about two‑thirds of the world’s memory chips, reported by gdelt.