"Global Tech Crisis"... Foreign Media Also Focus on Samsung Electronics' General Strike

Bloomberg Covers 'Samsung Indefinite Strike
Global Tech Faces Crisis'
BBC Reports Union-Management Disagreement
Taiwan Market Research Firm TrendForce
"Samsung's Process Highly Automated
No Issues Expected from Strike"

As the 'National Samsung Electronics Labor Union' (Jeonsamno), which has the largest number of members at Samsung Electronics, launched an indefinite general strike, major global media outlets have focused on reporting this news and analyzing its impact on Samsung Electronics' 'semiconductor competition.'

At the rally for the general strike held on the 8th in front of the main gate of Samsung Electronics Hwaseong Plant in Hwaseong, Gyeonggi-do, where the National Samsung Electronics Labor Union, Samsung Electronics' largest union, declared a three-day total strike, the struggle flag is being carried in. Photo by Yongjun Cho jun21@

According to industry sources and foreign media on the 11th, Bloomberg News seriously covered Jeonsamno's declaration of a general strike under the headline "Global Tech Faces Crisis Due to Samsung Workers' Indefinite Strike." The outlet added a subheading stating, "Thousands of workers may leave Samsung Electronics' semiconductor plants this week," and reported, "Although Samsung Electronics achieved strong performance in the second quarter due to a boom in investment in artificial intelligence (AI) infrastructure and increased demand for memory chips, investors are now concerned about Samsung's market position competing with SK Hynix in AI memory chips due to this union's general strike."

British public broadcaster BBC highlighted the differing views between Jeonsamno and management regarding production disruptions caused by the strike. BBC reported, "Jeonsamno said their strike would disrupt the company's production, but Samsung Electronics denied this," adding expert opinion from Yoon Jeong-in, CEO of Fibonacci Asset Management Global, who told BBC, "In our view, there will be no production disruption." The report also introduced Samsung Electronics as the world's largest manufacturer of memory chips, smartphones, and TVs, the fourth largest company in Asia, and the largest group operated by an owner family.

Taiwan, which owns TSMC, a competitor in the foundry (semiconductor contract manufacturing) sector, is closely monitoring the strike situation. Taiwanese market research firm TrendForce stated, "Samsung Electronics' processes are already highly automated to the point that they do not require many personnel, so there should be no problems caused by the strike," but also noted that the strike coinciding with the 'Galaxy Unpacked 2024' event held at the Louvre Museum in Paris, France, is not positive. This implies that Samsung Electronics faces the variable of a strike at a time when it needs to focus on an important event. TrendForce also reported, "Samsung Electronics is receiving quality tests for high-bandwidth memory (HBM) products from Nvidia."

Jeonsamno originally planned a second strike from the previous day until the 15th but revised this to begin an indefinite strike starting the previous day. Jeonsamno is demanding from management a one-day union founding leave, a basic wage increase rate of 3.5% for all members, improvements to the performance bonus system, and compensation for economic losses caused by the strike. Samsung Electronics is reportedly considering measures such as deploying replacement workers to cover absences caused by the strike. Samsung Electronics stated, "We plan to thoroughly prepare to prevent any production disruptions" and "We will continue efforts to resume dialogue with the union." Meanwhile, Jeonsamno is the largest union within the company, currently with about 31,000 members, accounting for 24.8% of Samsung Electronics' total workforce of approximately 125,000 employees.

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