SK hynix Achieves Record Quarterly Results in Q1, Posts 72% Operating Margin Ahead of Big Tech Peers (Roundup)

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[Financial News] SK hynix Inc. surpassed 50 trillion won in quarterly sales in the first quarter of this year, buoyed by the boom in AI memory. Operating profit came close to 40 trillion won, setting a new record for the company’s highest quarterly performance since its founding. As profitability surged on stronger sales of high-value memory products such as High Bandwidth Memory (HBM) and enterprise solid-state drive (eSSD), the company plans to sharply increase investment this year to strengthen its leadership in AI memory. 
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SK hynix Inc. said on the 23rd that it posted sales of 52.5763 trillion won, operating profit of 37.6103 trillion won, and net profit of 40.3459 trillion won in the first quarter of this year. Sales and operating profit rose 198.1% and 405.5%, respectively, from a year earlier. Net profit also came in at 40.3459 trillion won. 
On a quarterly basis, sales topped 50 trillion won for the first time ever. Operating profit and operating margin also hit record highs of 37.6103 trillion won and 72%, respectively, since the company’s founding. Operating profit more than doubled from the previous quarter, clearly showing the improvement in profitability. The operating margin also outpaced major AI memory and accelerator companies such as Samsung Electronics Co., Ltd. (43%) and Nvidia Corporation (65%). 
SK hynix Inc. explained that "despite the first quarter being a seasonal off-peak period, demand remained strong as AI infrastructure investment expanded, and the company continued its upward earnings trend by increasing sales of high-value products such as HBM, high-capacity server DRAM modules, and eSSD." 
Backed by the strong earnings, cash and cash equivalents at the end of the first quarter rose by 19.4 trillion won from the end of the previous quarter to 54.3 trillion won. Meanwhile, borrowings fell by 2.9 trillion won to 19.3 trillion won, resulting in 35 trillion won in net cash.
The company said that as AI evolves from large-model training to agentic AI, which repeatedly performs real-time inference across diverse service environments, the demand base for memory is expanding across DRAM and NAND flash memory. It also projected that the spread of memory optimization technologies will improve the economics of AI services and lead to larger overall service scale, further boosting memory demand. Based on this, it expects favorable pricing conditions to continue in both DRAM and NAND flash memory.
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SK hynix Inc. said it will continue developing and supplying new products across DRAM and NAND flash memory to respond to diversified memory demand. For HBM, it will further strengthen its comprehensive execution capabilities that integrate performance, yield, quality, and supply stability. In DRAM, it will begin full-scale supply of LPDDR6, the world’s first to use a 10-nanometer-class sixth-generation (1c) process, as well as 192GB SOCAMM2, which started mass production this month based on the same process.
For NAND flash memory, after beginning supply of the PQC21 client SSD, a cSSD using 321-layer QLC technology based on CTF, the company will respond flexibly to AI demand across the board with a lineup spanning high-performance TLC NAND flash memory and high-capacity QLC across the eSSD segment. In particular, it plans to strengthen its competitiveness in the AI data center and AI PC storage markets by leveraging synergies with Solidigm, which has strengths in high-capacity QLC eSSD.
Meanwhile, SK hynix Inc. emphasized that as customer demand continues to exceed supply capacity, securing the ability to meet supply needs in the era of AI has emerged as a core competitive advantage. It said investment this year will rise significantly from a year earlier, centered on M15X ramp-up, infrastructure preparation for the Yongin Semiconductor Cluster, and securing key equipment such as EUV. SK hynix Inc. said, "We will strategically expand our production base so we can proactively respond to medium- and long-term demand growth," and added, "Through investment that reflects demand visibility, we will secure both supply stability and financial soundness."
soup@fnnews.com Lim Su-bin Reporter