Officials of Samsung Electronics Donghaeng Labor Union, largely comprising Device eXperience employees, speak outside Samsung Electronics’ main gate in Suwon, Gyeonggi Province, on Friday. (Yonhap) Samsung Electronics’ tentative 2026 wage agreement is facing backlash from employees in its consumer electronics and mobile division.Union leaders accuse management of shaping the deal around the company’s booming memory chip business while leaving finished-product workers behind.The Suwon branch of the National Samsung Electronics Union and Samsung Electronics Donghaeng Labor Union, whose members are largely from the Device eXperience division, held a press conference Friday outside Samsung Digital City in Suwon, Gyeonggi Province, pledging to campaign against the deal.The Device eXperience division oversees Samsung’s finished-product businesses, including smartphones, TVs and home appliances.“The wage talks have effectively been reduced to a bonus deal for the memory business,” the unions said. They argued that the agreement is tilted toward the Device Solutions division, Samsung’s semiconductor business, while DX employees are being sidelined.At the center of the dispute is Samsung’s performance-based pay system. The unions say the current structure allows certain business units to benefit far more than others, despite contributions made across the company during years when the chip business was under pressure.“DX helped keep the company steady with stable operating profit when semiconductors were struggling,” said Lee Ho-seop, head of the NESU’s Suwon branch. “Now that performance has recovered, it is hard to accept a system where only one side reaps the gains.”“This is not simply about asking for more money,” he added. “DX employees want their contribution and sacrifice to be recognized. Samsung Electronics is one company, but its bonus system is driving a wedge between divisions.”The unions said the tentative agreement falls short of their key demands, including greater transparency in how bonuses are calculated and the removal of bonus caps. They also criticized what they described as a stopgap approach through special bonuses, saying the company has yet to clearly explain how operating profit is calculated or how rewards are allocated.The deal also includes an agreement for labor and management to drop civil and criminal lawsuits filed against each other, a point that has raised suspicion among some employees.“Employees are asking whether the company used lawsuits as leverage during the talks,” Lee said. “Management needs to explain clearly why the lawsuits are being withdrawn.”Signs of discontent have surfaced on Samsung’s internal message boards, according to the unions, with DX employees posting phrases such as “mourning” and “DX being passed over” to express anger over what they see as their division being overlooked.“For an organization that had largely stayed quiet in the past, this level of open protest shows how deep the frustration has become,” a union official said.The backlash has also coincided with a sharp rise in union membership. Koo Jung-hwan, secretary-general of Donghaeng, said in a statement that the union gained 10,000 members in a single day.He accused the leadership of the joint union of trying to exclude Donghaeng members from the ongoing vote on the tentative agreement, saying it appeared to fear how the new members would vote.“Excluding Donghaeng members, who took part in the negotiations as part of the joint bargaining group, is unlawful and an abuse of discretion,” Koo said. “If they push ahead with the exclusion, we will take every legal step available, including filing for corrective action with the Labor Relations Commission.”Lee also said voting rights should be guaranteed for all union members, regardless of whether their union formally belongs to the joint bargaining group.“There is already a precedent in which the DX union took part in a vote on a tentative agreement, even though it was not part of the joint bargaining group,” he said. “It does not make sense to deny voting rights now on that basis.”He added that if Donghaeng members are later recognized as eligible voters, the legitimacy of the vote already underway could be challenged.The unions also took aim at Roh Tae-moon, president and head of the DX division, saying he had failed to communicate with employees during months of wage negotiations.“DX employees have gone through months of disappointment and frustration, but President Roh Tae-moon has not meaningfully engaged with them,” Lee said. “He should meet employees as soon as he returns to Korea and discuss how to restore morale.”Union officials said the anger among DX workers is not simply about the size of the payout.“People outside the company assume all Samsung Electronics employees are receiving hundreds of millions of won in bonuses,” a union official said. “Employees are now left explaining to family and friends that the headlines do not reflect their own paychecks.”