Continued losses in the foundry business, delays in delivering HBM, weak NAND prices and US restrictions on sales to China all contributed to the fall. Operating margin was 4.4% its lowest in 15 years.
It is estimated that Samsung lost around $3 billion in its foundry business in Q2 as it failed to attract customers for its advanced processes while yields remain low and TSMC soaks up all the big customers for leading-edge nodes.
Samsung’s Texas fab development has been delayed due to lack of foundry customers and the company’s foundry market share has fallen from 19% in 2019 to 8% amid rumours that the foundry unit may be closed down.
Samsung has so far failed to get Nvidia’s approval for its latest HBM chip the HBM3E.
“The non-memory business experienced a decline in earnings due to sales restrictions and related inventory value adjustments stemming from US export restrictions on advanced AI chips for China, as well as continued low utilisation rates,” said Samsung.
