Samsung May Secure Anthropic Chip Orders: A Turning Point for Its Foundry Business?

Samsung Electronics has opened a new strategic door for its long-loss-making foundry business by investing in AI star company Anthropic.

According to Yonhap News Agency on Friday, Anthropic recently completed its Series H financing, raising $65 billion and reaching a post-money valuation of $965 billion (approximately 144 trillion Korean won). Samsung Electronics, SK hynix, and Micron participated in this round of financing as "strategic infrastructure partners."

Notably, Anthropic explicitly mentioned the supply of "logic chips" in its announcement. Among the three investors, only Samsung Electronics has a foundry business. This statement has been widely interpreted by the industry as indicating that Samsung is likely to undertake the foundry orders for AI chips required by Anthropic's "Claude" model.

If this potential order materializes, it will be another significant milestone for Samsung's foundry business, which has recently secured several major clients. Previously, Samsung had already won the foundry contracts for Tesla's new generation of AI chips, "AI5" and "AI6," and undertaken the production of NVIDIA's inference-specific language processing chip, "Groq3." The industry expects that as its core AI customer base continues to expand, Samsung's foundry business is likely to turn profitable next year.

Logic Chip Mention Becomes a Key Signal

In its financing announcement, Anthropic emphasized that the technologies of its three semiconductor partners play a "core role in global memory, storage, and logic chip supply," stating that this partnership will help "stably expand computing power to meet customer needs."

The production process of logic chips falls squarely within the core business scope of foundries. Since neither SK hynix nor Micron has a foundry division, industry analysts believe that the aforementioned statement actually points to Samsung Electronics, implying that the cooperation between the two parties will extend beyond mere memory supply to the contract manufacturing of AI chips.

Major Clients Placing Orders, Foundry Business Accelerating Recovery

Samsung Foundry's recent customer expansion momentum has significantly accelerated. In addition to Tesla's AI chips and NVIDIA's Groq3 chips, Samsung will also supply image sensors for Apple's new iPhone models next year.

Currently, Samsung ranks second in the global foundry market with a 7.2% market share. However, compared to TSMC, which holds a 69.9% market share, the gap remains as high as 62.7 percentage points. Samsung's foundry business has recorded losses for several consecutive years. If it can successfully add Anthropic to its client portfolio, it will further solidify its competitive position in the AI chip foundry sector.

"One-Stop Solution" Becomes a Differentiating Factor

Samsung has positioned its investment in Anthropic as a comprehensive strategic cooperation covering "AI semiconductors, memory, foundry, and AI infrastructure." The company highlights its "one-stop solution," integrating High Bandwidth Memory (HBM), advanced process foundry services, and advanced packaging, as its core differentiator.

As the focus of competition in the AI market evolves from single HBM supply to a full-chain ecosystem encompassing AI chip design, production, packaging, and system optimization, Samsung is attempting to leverage its full-stack semiconductor capabilities to secure greater strategic space in the industrial landscape of the AI era.

A semiconductor industry insider stated, "Samsung's investment should not be viewed merely as a financial move, but rather as a signal of deepening strategic relations with core players in the AI era. Expectations are rising regarding whether Samsung Foundry can seize new opportunities through the expansion of the AI market."