Samsung's 2nd and 3rd unions say Samsung is not a total semiconductor company, urge that the voices of 50,000 DX employees be reflected

[Financial News] Ahead of the final round of wage negotiations and a general strike, Samsung Electronics' second- and third-largest unions, the National Samsung Electronics Union (NSEU) and the Samsung Electronics Union (SECU), visited the enterprise-level labor union and appealed, saying, "Samsung Electronics is not a total semiconductor company. It is a total electronics company." They added, "We ask that the voices of 50,000 employees in the Device eXperience (DX) Division be clearly reflected."
 They argued that the current wage talks are focused only on performance bonuses for the Device Solutions Division (DS Division), which includes semiconductors, while the DX Division is being left out of the negotiations.
 On the 18th, when the second post-mediation session between Samsung Electronics management and labor was held at the Ministry of Employment and Labor (MOEL), senior officials from the NSEU and the Samsung Electronics Union stopped Choi Seung-ho, chairman of the Samsung Electronics branch of the Samsung Group Supercorporate Labor Union, as he was heading to the post-mediation meeting room at the National Labor Relations Commission. They said, "We came all the way here because our position was being ignored. We ask that the DX Division agenda be clearly applied," and delivered their bargaining demands for the DX Division.
 In response, Choi said, "We negotiated together, so it is difficult to change that now."
 The NSEU and the Samsung Electronics Union countered, "We are not asking you to change it. We are asking you to recognize the proposals that were already sufficiently revised during the bargaining process." They added, "We made it clear from the beginning that the DX Division was part of the discussion. Isn't it only natural that its exclusion is a problem?"
 Instead of giving a detailed answer, Choi said, "I will do my best," and left for the meeting room.
 The NSEU and the Samsung Electronics Union agree with the enterprise-level labor union on institutionalizing, making transparent, and removing the cap on the excess profit performance bonus (OPI) system. However, they have raised serious concerns that the current bonus talks are leaning too heavily toward the semiconductor division. They argue that, since the semiconductor downturn has been weathered through the performance and investment funds of the DX Division, discussions on how to allocate bonus resources should also be handled on a companywide basis.
 The six key demands in the agenda delivered by the NSEU and the Samsung Electronics Union to Choi were: institutionalizing, making transparent, and removing the cap on OPI; securing the companywide common fund portion of OPI payments; strengthening transparency in how bonuses for executives and directors are calculated; guaranteeing a 7% base salary increase in 2026; abolishing the comprehensive wage system and paying legitimate overtime; and improving the annual salary cap system.
 Lee Ho-seok, head of the Suwon Branch of the National Samsung Electronics Union, said, "The reason we are here is that this year's wage negotiations have been conducted almost entirely around semiconductor performance bonuses, so the benefits that DX employees should receive have been completely ignored. This is 'DX passing.'" He added, "I believe performance can be shared sufficiently under the banner of one Samsung."
jhyuk@fnnews.com Kim Jun-hyuk Reporter