Samsung confident its semiconductor business turnaround happens in 2026: starts with HBM4

Samsung Electronics is coming out swinging in the semiconductor business in 2026, with its next-gen 1c DRAM ready to rock and roll in the HBM4 business.

Samsung Electronics Chairman Lee Jae-yong recently returned from a visit to big tech companies through San Francisco and Silicon Valley over the last two weeks, with the chairman saying: "we have prepared for next year's business". Analysts have interpreted that as the company chief personally stepping in and reinforcing its customer base for a full revival, as its semiconductor division in both memory and foundry, both suffering against rivals like SK hynix and TSMC.

We can expect some big changes in Samsung's major customers between the first half of 2025, and the first half of 2026, as it begins mass supplying its next-gen HBM4 memory to customers like NVIDIA and AMD. Samsung has been slowly but surely completing its next-generation technologies one at a time, after a few years of rather big struggles and missteps, but it's preparing for a huge year in 2026.

According to sources, on August 19, Samsung Electronics had reached its target yield earlier than planned in the development stage for its next-gen 1c DRAM, and that it's now ready for mass production either at the same time as HBM rival SK hynix, or around 1-2 months earlier. However, at its current pace of development, it could start ramp-up that would be a huge 3-6 months ahead of SK hynix.

Samsung had originally planned to begin mass production of its next-generation 12-stack HBM4 memory based on its 10nm-class 6th-generation (1c) DRAM this year, but delayed it until 2026. Samsung is taking a more cautious approach, with targets set for Production Readiness Approval (PRA) in Q4 2025, showing good news for its 1c DRAM redesign process, with improvements to performance and yield.