SEOUL (Reuters) – Samsung Electronics has signed a new agreement with U.S. chip designer Broadcom to significantly expand cooperation in memory chips, contract chip manufacturing and advanced semiconductor packaging through 2030.
The companies said the long-term collaboration is expected to exceed $200 billion in value and is aimed at strengthening support for artificial intelligence (AI) and high-performance computing applications.
Samsung said the expanded partnership reflects its strategy of providing end-to-end semiconductor technologies as demand grows for custom AI processors and advanced computing solutions.
The agreement comes as major technology companies increasingly develop their own application-specific integrated circuits (ASICs) instead of relying solely on general-purpose graphics processors, boosting demand for specialised chip design and manufacturing.
Under the memorandum of understanding, Broadcom's expertise in custom AI chip design will be combined with Samsung's manufacturing capabilities over the next five years.
Samsung said Broadcom's next-generation high-speed communications chips will be manufactured using its advanced sub-2-nanometre process technology. The two companies will also collaborate on next-generation high-bandwidth memory (HBM) products.
The partnership is expected to strengthen Samsung's foundry business as it seeks to narrow the gap with industry leader TSMC by attracting more major technology customers.
Last month, Samsung Co-CEO and Head of the Device Solutions Division Jun Young-hyun said he had discussed next-generation foundry cooperation with Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang, including future HBM4E and HBM5 memory products.
Samsung also said it expects to secure additional orders for its 2-nanometre foundry process following discussions with leading technology companies. Last year, the company won a $16.5 billion contract to manufacture logic chips for electric vehicle maker Tesla.