Author: Raymond Zhong / Source: New York Times
Samsung Electronics, the South Korean giant, on Wednesday reported a roughly one-fifth increase in operating profit for the latest quarter from a year earlier, sending profit to a new high of around $15 billion.
But industry observers say that the driving force behind the company’s recent performance — a boom in memory chips, fueled by soaring demand for data centers and smartphones — is looking wobbly.
Samsung is the world’s largest smartphone maker, but it also makes many of the computer chips, camera sensors and displays that go into other companies’ devices. That has positioned it to prosper even from the success of rivals like Apple.
Of late, though, demand for smartphones and other consumer electronics has been plateauing. And as memory-chip producers, Samsung included, have invested in operations to expand production, supply is catching up.
The question is how much, and how quickly, the prices of memory storage will fall. Samsung’s share price has already dropped about one-sixth this year.
In a conference call with analysts on Wednesday, company executives said…
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