Samsung expected to regain top spot in global memory chip sales

Samsung Electronics is expected to regain the top position in global dynamic random-access memory (DRAM) revenue for Q4 2025, overtaking SK hynix, according to industry sources.

The South Korean company is projected to post an operating profit of over 18 trillion won (US$12.2 billion) for the quarter, with its semiconductor division contributing 15.1 trillion won, up 422% year-on-year.

Samsung had lost its long-held DRAM market lead to SK hynix in Q1 2025, mainly due to competition over high bandwidth memory (HBM) chips, which are critical for AI applications.

Analysts cite Samsung’s recovery to narrowing the technology gap in HBM and rising prices for conventional DRAM products driven by AI infrastructure investments.

The average price of 8-gigabit DDR4 DRAM rose 15.7% month-on-month to US$8.1 in November, according to DRAMeXchange.

🔗 Source: Yonhap

🧠 Food for thought

Implications, context, and why it matters.

Conventional DRAM pricing drove Samsung’s Q4 jump as 8‑gigabit (Gb, a unit of memory capacity) DDR4 rose 15.7% month on month to $8.1 in November.
NVIDIA approved Samsung’s HBM3E (the latest generation of High Bandwidth Memory) only in late September after an 18 month gap from development. HBM share gains were limited, as SK hynix and Micron handled most orders 1.
Google’s HBM buys run through Broadcom (a chip and networking supplier), with Samsung supplying over 60% in 2025 2. NVIDIA accounts for 66% of Chip-on-Wafer-on-Substrate (CoWoS, an advanced packaging process that integrates processors with HBM) demand in 2026 3. Capacity plans were cut to 150K wafers per month by end 2025 from 170K. Shipment forecasts fell from 80 billion Gb to 60 billion Gb (Gb refers to gigabits, how memory output is typically measured) 4.
Blackwell generation accelerators (NVIDIA’s upcoming AI chips) need about 2x to 2.4x more DRAM than prior parts 4. They use packages up to 3.3x reticle size (the maximum area printable in a single lithography exposure) versus Hopper (NVIDIA’s prior generation) 5.
Non Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Company (TSMC) CoWoS class share held by ASE, Amkor, and SJSemi (SJ Semiconductor, a China based advanced packaging firm) will reach 31% by Q4 2026 6. That is up from 26% in late 2024. HBM4 (the next generation of High Bandwidth Memory) has a 53% higher average selling price than HBM3E, which lifts memory above 50% of the bill of materials for top accelerators and creates margin pressure that could shift demand toward cost efficient packaging 6.