South Korean tech giants commit over $550B to ease ‘RAMageddon’
South Korean tech giants commit over $550B to ease ‘RAMageddon’
韩国科技巨头承诺投入超 5500 亿美元以缓解“内存末日”（RAMageddon）
The world’s two largest memory chip companies plan to invest $518 billion (~800 trillion won) to build four new memory fabs in southwestern South Korea, a region that has historically attracted little semiconductor investment. The announcement is part of the country’s sweeping national investment plan spanning semiconductors, AI data centers, and physical AI, which was unveiled at a presidential briefing on Monday, with the chairmen of Samsung and SK Hynix in attendance. 全球最大的两家存储芯片公司计划投资 5180 亿美元（约合 800 万亿韩元），在韩国西南部建设四座新的存储芯片工厂。该地区历史上鲜有半导体投资。这一公告是韩国宏大的国家投资计划的一部分，该计划涵盖半导体、人工智能数据中心和物理人工智能。周一，在总统简报会上，三星和 SK 海力士的董事长出席了会议并公布了该计划。
The plan breaks down into three buckets. In the memory chip bucket is $518 billion for four new memory fabs in the southwest, plus $52 billion for an HBM (high bandwidth memory) packaging hub in the central region. Then there’s another $356 billion (550 trillion won) for AI data centers to be built by Korean tech and energy behemoths such as SK, GS, and Naver through 2035. All told, South Korean tech companies have committed to spend over $900 billion on AI and the demands for chips it is creating. With this, the nation hopes to catapult itself into becoming more of an AI power player than it already is. 该计划分为三个部分。在存储芯片领域，将投入 5180 亿美元在西南部建设四座新工厂，另投入 520 亿美元在中部地区建设高带宽内存（HBM）封装中心。此外，SK、GS 和 Naver 等韩国科技与能源巨头将在 2035 年前投入 3560 亿美元（550 万亿韩元）用于建设人工智能数据中心。总计，韩国科技公司已承诺在人工智能及其带来的芯片需求上投入超过 9000 亿美元。韩国希望借此进一步巩固其作为人工智能强国的地位。
Currently, Samsung and SK Hynix (along with U.S. memory chip maker Micron) are all enjoying record demand from what’s been called RAMageddon, a worldwide shortage of memory chips caused by the AI buildout. “Semiconductors, physical AI, and AI data centers are the triple axis for South Korea’s next industrial era,” President Jae Myung Lee said in a televised address Monday, calling 2026 the year South Korea must establish itself as an “irreplaceable” industrial power. 目前，三星和 SK 海力士（以及美国存储芯片制造商美光）正受益于所谓的“内存末日”（RAMageddon）——即由人工智能建设热潮引发的全球存储芯片短缺，其需求量创下历史新高。韩国总统李在明周一在电视讲话中表示：“半导体、物理人工智能和人工智能数据中心是韩国下一个工业时代的三大支柱。”他称 2026 年是韩国必须确立其“不可替代”工业强国地位的关键一年。
Lee said existing chip facilities in Yongin and Pyeongtaek, the heart of South Korea’s semiconductor belt just south of Seoul, have “already reached their limits,” and urged companies to accelerate investment in the southwest, hoping to spread the AI wealth beyond the nation’s capital. “We must secure overwhelming production capacity in advance,” he said. Yet, Lee pushed back against media reports that the government had pressured companies into the investments, reportedly saying the decisions reflected the companies’ own judgment. “The government’s role is to invest its capabilities so that companies can invest without losses and with better prospects,” he was quoted as saying. 李在明表示，位于首尔以南、作为韩国半导体产业核心地带的龙仁和平泽，其现有芯片设施“已经达到极限”。他敦促企业加快在西南部的投资，希望将人工智能带来的红利扩散到首都以外的地区。“我们必须提前确保压倒性的生产能力，”他说道。不过，李在明反驳了有关政府向企业施压进行投资的媒体报道，据称他表示这些决定反映了企业自身的判断。他被引述称：“政府的角色是投入自身资源，以便企业能够在没有损失且前景更好的情况下进行投资。”
Samsung separately published a press release Monday, announcing plans to invest 2,655 trillion won (~$1.7 trillion) over the next decade, with 425 trillion won earmarked for the Honam region, the southwestern corner of the Korean peninsula. The company cited expected incentives around power, water, workforce, and living conditions as key factors in selecting Gwangju, roughly 300 kilometers south of Seoul, for a new semiconductor fab, alongside an AI data center in Haenam, at the southern tip of the peninsula. That is not an outlandish sum compared to U.S. tech giants Alphabet, Amazon, Meta, and Microsoft, which will collectively spend $650 billion on AI infrastructure this year alone, according to Reuters. 三星周一另行发布新闻稿，宣布计划在未来十年内投资 2655 万亿韩元（约合 1.7 万亿美元），其中 425 万亿韩元将专门用于朝鲜半岛西南角的湖南地区。该公司指出，在电力、水资源、劳动力和生活条件方面的预期激励措施，是其选择在首尔以南约 300 公里的光州建设新半导体工厂，并在半岛南端的海南建设人工智能数据中心的关键因素。据路透社报道，与美国科技巨头 Alphabet、亚马逊、Meta 和微软相比，这一数字并不夸张，因为这些公司仅今年一年就将在人工智能基础设施上共同投入 6500 亿美元。
Meanwhile, SK Group announced a 2,100 trillion won (~$1.4 trillion) medium- to long-term investment roadmap, 1,100 trillion won to expand semiconductor production capacity and 1,000 trillion won for AI data centers nationwide. SK Hynix, the group’s core semiconductor affiliate, is central to the chip expansion push, while SK Telecom will lead the buildout of 15 gigawatts of AI data center capacity across the country. 与此同时，SK 集团宣布了一项 2100 万亿韩元（约合 1.4 万亿美元）的中长期投资路线图，其中 1100 万亿韩元用于扩大半导体产能，1000 万亿韩元用于在全国范围内建设人工智能数据中心。SK 海力士作为集团的核心半导体子公司，是此次芯片扩张计划的核心，而 SK 电讯将负责在全国范围内建设 15 吉瓦（GW）的人工智能数据中心容量。
Whether the ambition translates into execution is another question. Deep tech industries like semiconductors and AI don’t move on political or even customer demand timelines. Fabs take years to build and the risk is that, by the time they are ready, the demand that caused them will have ebbed, leaving companies with oversupply and crashing prices. For now, the world’s AI chip supply chain, especially those hungry for all things memory, will be watching to see if South Korea can pull it off. 这些雄心壮志能否转化为实际执行是另一个问题。半导体和人工智能等深科技行业的发展并不遵循政治或客户需求的时间表。晶圆厂的建设需要数年时间，风险在于，当它们准备就绪时，引发建设需求的热潮可能已经消退，导致企业面临供应过剩和价格暴跌。目前，全球人工智能芯片供应链，尤其是那些对存储产品需求迫切的领域，将拭目以待，看韩国能否实现这一目标。