Samsung Electronics just locked down the kind of deal that reshapes an entire industry’s power dynamics. The South Korean tech giant signed a memorandum of understanding with Broadcom on July 25, valued at more than $200 billion through 2030, covering AI chip production across memory, foundry services, and advanced packaging.
What the deal actually covers
The partnership positions Samsung as a critical supplier for Broadcom’s custom AI application-specific integrated circuits, commonly known as ASICs. The MOU spans three key areas: memory chips, foundry services (the actual fabrication of chips), and advanced packaging. Advanced packaging is the process of stacking and connecting chip components in ways that dramatically improve performance, and it’s become a critical bottleneck in AI hardware production.
This deal arrives just months after Samsung announced a record investment of over $73 billion for chip expansion and R&D in 2026 alone, a figure disclosed on March 19.
Samsung has been playing catch-up in both the foundry and high-bandwidth memory markets. Its foundry business has lagged behind TSMC, the Taiwanese giant that manufactures chips for Apple, NVIDIA, and most other major players. And in memory, rival SK Hynix has been eating Samsung’s lunch with superior high-bandwidth memory products favored by NVIDIA.
