Samsung's Q3 Revenue Hit New Record High

In 2020, Samsung weathered the pandemic by posting a record third-quarter revenue of 66.96 trillion won. The company just revealed that it set another record for the same period in 2021, reaching 73.98 trillion won, or about $ 63 billion. While its revenue was up about 10 percent, Samsung says its profits grew 26 percent from last year to reach 15.82 trillion won ($ 13 billion).

Despite a shortage of key chips around the world, the memory chips and processors that Samsung makes that go to everything from servers to mobile phones are in as much demand as ever. Shifts to hybrid work mean businesses buy more SSD, CPU and RAM for servers

As the world's largest chipmaker, high memory chip prices mean big profits for Samsung, even as rising costs for raw materials and logistics reduce the profits of its consumer electronics division. Its memory division sales specifically increased 46 compared to the same period last year, while the semiconductor division's profits as a whole nearly doubled, from 5.54 trillion won to 10.06 trillion won. won (~ $ 8.5 billion) (pdf).

Samsung is also the world's largest phone maker and says it saw strong demand for foldable phones like its Galaxy Z Flip 3 and Galaxy Z Fold 3 and the lower to mid-range Galaxy smartphones it produces.

Despite reports of potential production issues and slashed manufacturing targets for Apple's iPhone 13 line, Samsung says its mobile display earnings increased "driven by demand for newly launched products from major customers in the US smartphones". The most important customer that Samsung supplies its mobile OLED displays to is Apple, and that company will report its quarterly earnings tomorrow.

Looking ahead, Samsung expects solid earnings for its mobile displays in the fourth quarter, and not just for phones. There is a demand for OLED in larger devices like laptops, tablets, and especially game consoles like Nintendo's new OLED Switch, which uses a panel made by Samsung.

As for its TV business, the company focuses on the high-end and says it is on track to start producing new equipment based on quantum dots that will continue Samsung's fight against LG's OLED TVs.