They punted on CES 2022 big time, with their stand attracting the bulk of the people who actually turned up at the Las Vegas show, now Samsung is predicting a 52% jump in profit for the past three months of 2021, despite shipping delays and processor shortages.
As other big brands such as archrival LG were pulling out of the Las Vegas tech show, Samsung went ahead showing off new TVs, their sustainability program and new Bespoke appliances and a new Galaxy S1 FE smartphone.
The big South Korean Company said at the weekend said that they expect to deliver a A$16.1-billion-dollar profit for the quarter. Analysts were expecting $17.9 billion.
Samsung’s spending on such things as employees’ bonuses and marketing for its smartphone business were seen as reasons for it missing the market forecast.
The company’s earnings were boosted by strong demand for server memory chips and higher profit margins in its chip contract manufacturing business.
“Samsung is well placed to profit from the record-breaking demand for PCs and electronics,” technology analyst Sam Reynolds told the BBC.
He also highlighted that the firm had benefited from currency fluctuations: “The Korean won continues to depreciate, making Korea’s exports more attractive on the global market.”
Currently, analysts and investors are keeping a close watch on the company’s chip manufacturing operation in Xi’an, in central China. The city has been in lockdown since 23 December due to a coronavirus outbreak.
Samsung said last week that it would “temporarily adjust operations” at its sites in Xi’an but gave no further details of how the measures could impact the production of microchips.
A new $23 billion dollar processor manufacturing plant in the US city of Taylor in Texas is expected to be operational by the second half of 2024. It is the South Korean electronics giant’s biggest-ever US investment.
Shares in Samsung Electronics were trading around 1.8% higher in Seoul on Friday.