Samsung Semiconductor to Receive 'Half-Year Salary' Bonus Early in the Year... Home Appliances Get Single-Digit Increase

DS Division This Year's OPI, 47~50% of Annual Salary
DX Division at 20~30% Range by Business Unit

Samsung Electronics achieved a record high performance with annual sales exceeding 279 trillion won. On the 7th, Samsung Electronics announced that its preliminary consolidated results for last year showed sales of 279.04 trillion won and an operating profit of 51.57 trillion won. The Samsung flag is fluttering in the wind in front of Samsung Electronics' Seocho building on this day. Photo by Mun Ho-nam munonam@

[Asia Economy Reporter Kim Pyeonghwa] Samsung Electronics plans to pay the DS Division, which is responsible for the semiconductor business, an OPI (Overperformance Incentive) at the highest level of 47-50% of the annual salary next month. As the semiconductor market downturn is expected to continue into next year, the scale of OPI payments next year is expected to decrease compared to this year.

On the 28th, Samsung Electronics' DS Division announced internally that this year's OPI payment rate could be around 47-50% of the annual salary. They also revealed plans to finalize the OPI payment rate after the final calculation process and pay it next month.

OPI is a system that pays a portion of the annual salary as a performance bonus within a 20% limit of the excess profit based on the achievement of the performance goals set at the beginning of the year. The maximum payment rate is 50% of the individual’s annual salary. It is paid once a year, with the payment timing in January each year after the annual performance is settled. It was previously called Profit Sharing (PS).

The OPI announced by the DS Division this year is at a level similar to last year. Although the semiconductor market downturn became prominent this year and performance worsened in the third quarter, thanks to the first half’s performance, it maintains a higher payment level than the DX Division.

In the DX Division, the MX Business Unit is expected to pay an OPI of 29-33%, and the Network Business Unit 22-26% this year. The Home Appliance Business Unit has announced the lowest OPI in the DX Division at 5-7%.

However, as the market downturn extends beyond this year, the DS Division’s OPI next year is likely to decrease compared to this year. Samsung Electronics expects next year’s OPI to be around 5-11% of the annual salary. In the securities industry, there are even negative forecasts that Samsung Electronics may record losses in the DS Division next year.

Another performance bonus system, the Target Achievement Incentive (TAI), has seen a reduction in payment scale due to economic downturn and decreased performance. Samsung Electronics announced that the DS Division’s second half TAI this month is 50% of the monthly base salary. TAI is a performance bonus paid twice a year based on the performance of each business unit. The maximum is 100% of the base salary.

Earlier, Samsung Electronics set the TAI payment scale at the maximum 100% for the first half of this year, including the DS Division and the DX Division. However, as performance worsened in the second half, the second half TAI for major DX units such as the MX Business Unit and VD Business Unit, as well as the DS Division, was reduced to about 50% of the base salary.

Meanwhile, the market expects Samsung Electronics to report poor results in the fourth quarter as well as the third quarter this year. According to financial information provider FnGuide, as of this day, Samsung Electronics’ fourth quarter sales consensus (average forecast by securities firms) is 73.6222 trillion KRW, down 3.84% from the same period last year. Operating profit is expected to plunge 47.56% to 7.2714 trillion KRW.

This content was produced with the assistance of AI translation services.