Nvidia has announced a series of landmark deals in South Korea with major technology firms including SK Hynix and Naver to secure critical memory chips for its AI ambitions.
The agreements were struck during a high-profile visit by Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang to South Korea, where he met the country’s top corporate leaders across a series of headline-grabbing appearances.
Nvidia and SK Hynix agreed to partner on designing future generations of memory chips for AI, signing a multi-year agreement covering both chip design and manufacturing.
SK Hynix will help Nvidia diversify into new arenas, including AI infrastructure, personal AI, and physical AI, as well as supplying memory for Vera Rubin, Nvidia’s most powerful accelerator.
Following a meeting with SK Group Chairman Chey Tae-won, Huang declared: “SK Hynix has been Nvidia’s largest memory partner. SK Hynix will continue to be Nvidia’s largest memory partner.”
The two companies will also apply AI to semiconductor chip design and manufacturing, using Nvidia CUDA-X libraries and Nvidia PhysicsNeMo to accelerate semiconductor simulations.
SK Hynix will advance factory digital twins by combining Nvidia Omniverse, OpenUSD scene optimization, and Nvidia cuOpt to drive fully autonomous fab operations.
SK Telecom separately announced it would build a gigawatt-scale AI cloud in South Korea using Nvidia technology, with the first AI data center expected to come online in 2027.
Internet giant Naver and conglomerate Doosan also confirmed they would use Nvidia technology to help build AI data centers across the region.
Huang was candid about ongoing supply constraints, warning that everything from wafers to packaging to silicon photonics is in short supply, adding: “It is going to persist for several years.”
Nvidia believes its Vera CPUs will eventually represent a $200 billion business opportunity, supported by the continued expansion of AI agents across industries.
Despite the deal announcements, Samsung Electronics (005930) and SK Hynix both plunged in early trading, shaking South Korea’s benchmark Kospi index and broader global semiconductor markets.
The Kospi index fell almost 9% on the day after robust U.S. jobs data fueled bets on a Federal Reserve rate hike, sparking a widespread rout in global technology stocks.
Samsung shares fell below 300,000 won and SK Hynix dropped below 2 million won in early trading, with losses later narrowing after a circuit breaker was triggered and markets stabilized.
Samsung ultimately closed down 7.8% while SK Hynix finished 4.1% lower after both stocks trimmed early double-digit percentage losses during the volatile session.
The selloff compounded an already difficult stretch for chip stocks, with Micron Technology (MU) falling 13.2%, Sandisk Corp. dropping 11.4%, and Nvidia losing 6.2% on June 5.
Disappointment over Broadcom’s (AVGO) earnings guidance, combined with pressure from rising interest rates following a strong U.S. May employment report, weighed broadly on technology shares that week.
The Philadelphia Semiconductor Index tumbled 10.2% during that session, reflecting the scale of the pressure across the entire chip sector.
Huang dismissed concerns about the stock selloff, telling reporters: “Everybody should be very excited; they can now buy stock at a cheaper price, and it’s absolutely true that the future of AI is very bright.”
