Samsung in Pyeongtaek: the world's largest chip complex expands for the AI memory boom

The article, published by MIT Technology Review as a “dispatch” (a short on-the-ground report) and written by Michelle Kim, describes how Samsung is building a huge semiconductor manufacturing complex in Pyeongtaek, South Korea, to meet the demand for memory driven by artificial intelligence. The text received is short, so this summary is too, and it is limited to what the article reports.

The technical context is as follows: generative AI models run on powerful chips known as GPUs, which rely on stacks of specialized memory chips packaged alongside the processor. To meet growing demand for that memory, Samsung is building a massive facility in Pyeongtaek, a farming city south of Seoul where rice paddies border the complex. According to the text, the campus covers an area similar to New York's Central Park.

Three fabs are currently running around the clock and a fourth is coming online. Construction of a fifth was halted during the 2024 slump in memory chip demand, but resumed when the AI boom sent demand soaring again.

The dispatch portrays daily life on the site. Shortly before noon on a Monday, thousands of construction workers, dressed in black with sky-blue vests and hard hats bearing their names and fab numbers, stream out of the fabs toward cafeterias, buffets and beef stew restaurants. Some get around the campus on scooters or motorcycles. They pass signs advertising short-term studio rentals, and some step into real estate agencies, the same ones where Samsung engineers buy homes. The finished fabs, clad in Mondrian-style red, yellow and blue panels, stand out from across the street.

The author speaks with Choi Hye-rin, a 35-year-old safety manager who coordinates a team building cable conduits next to the fourth fab. Every day she arrives on one of the shuttle buses from Songtan, an older district. She writes reports, inspects equipment and checks the chemicals workers handle. According to the article, she is one of hundreds of women working on the site, many as signalers who walk ahead of heavy machinery. She earns 140,000 won ($97) a day and says the pay is better than at other construction sites and the work relatively easy. She hopes the boom will keep her busy: “You just keep coming back.”

Safety is a visible priority: banners with slogans such as “Even if the work runs late, don't rush,” a giant LED scoreboard listing the winners of a safety poetry contest, and hard hats bearing the pledge “I will not work if it's not safe.” At the same time, the atmosphere conveys urgency. Samsung expects demand for memory chips to keep growing through 2028. For years, the company has watched its domestic rival SK Hynix pull ahead in the global market for high-bandwidth memory, the kind that powers Nvidia's AI accelerators. Taiwan's TSMC, meanwhile, dominates the foundry business, manufacturing chips designed by other companies. According to the article, the Pyeongtaek expansion is Samsung's attempt to regain the lead in memory.

In short, the piece offers a more human than technical picture of the race for AI memory: a gigantic construction site, with thousands of workers and a strong safety culture, where Samsung is betting on several more years of growing demand. The text provides no figures on investment, production capacity or detailed timelines, so we do not include them here.