Samsung's "AI Wealth Gap" Revealed: Chip Division Employees Receive an Average Bonus of $2.32 million, While Non-Chip Division Employees Receive Only $27,000

BlockBeats News, May 27th: Samsung Electronics employees voted to approve the latest salary agreement, avoiding a planned 18-day large-scale strike. About 74% of the employees supported the proposal, and Samsung's stock price rose by 8% on the same day.

Under the agreement, Samsung's chip division employees will receive a fixed cash bonus equivalent to 50% of their annual salary and a 10.5% special bonus linked to the semiconductor business's profit, some of which will be distributed in the form of stocks. Bloomberg estimated that the average bonus for chip division employees is about 513 million Korean won (approximately 2.32 million RMB), with some storage chip employees receiving bonuses of up to 600 million Korean won.

In contrast, non-chip business employees receive an average bonus of only about 6 million Korean won (approximately 27,000 RMB), leading to internal disputes over the hundredfold income gap.

Driven by the demand for AI infrastructure, Samsung's semiconductor business has seen a significant increase in profit. In the first quarter of this year, the chip division's profit surged by 48 times year-on-year. The market expects Samsung's full-year operating profit to reach 300 trillion Korean won, far exceeding the historical peak in 2018.

Meanwhile, SK Hynix and Micron's market values have recently surpassed $1 trillion for the first time, with the market continuing to bet on the global memory chip supercycle driven by AI.