Amkor to top semiconductor packaging sector with better tech

Amkor Technology Inc., the world’s No. 2 semiconductor packaging company, aims to take the sector throne by improving technology competitiveness, the president of its South Korean unit said on Wednesday.

The US-based company plans to focus on next-generation semiconductor packaging technology to take on current industry leader Taiwan’s ASE Holdings.

“We will enhance the next-generation semiconductor packaging technology competitiveness to become the company of a century,” Amkor Korea Technology President Ji JongRip said on the company’s 55th anniversary.

Amkor Technology, currently headquartered in Tempe, Arizona, was founded as Anam Industrial Co. in 1968 in South Korea. The late Honorary Chairman Kim Hyang-Soo and Executive Chairman Kim Joo-Jin, his eldest son, established a production base in the country and a research and development unit in the US.

KOREAN UNIT TO LEAD GLOBAL GROWTH

The company generated some 9 trillion won ($7.1 billion) in annual sales from 20 manufacturing facilities with more than 30,000 employees in eight countries.

Amkor Technology Korea, which operates semiconductor packaging and testing facilities with some 7,300 staff in the country, said its operating profit more than doubled to 250.1 billion won last year with sales up 45.4% to 4.5 trillion won.

The unit has been expanding its business in the country since it built a global R&D center and a state-of-the-art semiconductor packaging production line in Songdo International Business District, about 30 kilometers southwest of Seoul. It plans to hire more than 1,300 new employees this year after adding some 1,700 in 2022.

Amkor Technology Korea led the establishment of a unit and a semiconductor packaging line in Vietnam with a target of commercial operations in the fourth quarter.

“Amkor Korea is a leader in cutting-edge packaging technology with know-how and R&D capabilities accumulated over more than half a century,” Ji said. “We aim to keep growing to become main engines of the group’s future along with the Vietnamese unit.”

Write to Jeong-Soo Hwang at hjs@hankyung.com
 
Jongwoo Cheon edited this article.