South Korean memory chipmaker SK Hynix is set to begin trading on the Nasdaq on Friday, giving U.S. investors direct exposure to a company that has emerged as one of the biggest beneficiaries of the artificial intelligence boom.
The listing follows a more than sevenfold rise in the company’s share price over the past year, driven by surging demand for high-bandwidth memory (HBM) chips used in AI processors. The rally has lifted SK Hynix’s market capitalization to about $1 trillion, making it South Korea’s second most valuable company after Samsung Electronics.
The company plans to raise about $29 billion through the sale of American depositary receipts (ADRs), according to a regulatory filing, with proceeds earmarked for new factories and semiconductor equipment.
SK Hynix dominates the market for HBM, a type of advanced memory that stacks multiple layers of chips to boost performance for AI workloads. The chips are used in Nvidia’s AI accelerators, making the U.S. chip designer one of SK Hynix’s biggest customers.
In June, Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang visited Seoul, where the companies announced a multi-year partnership.
“That advantage has positioned SK Hynix as one of the biggest beneficiaries of the rapid growth in AI infra,” said TrendForce analyst Ellie Wang.
The company will trade under the ticker symbol SKHY, initially using the temporary symbol SKHYV.
Founded in 1983 as Hyundai Electronics, the company has transformed from a cyclical memory manufacturer into a key supplier for AI infrastructure. It became SK Hynix after SK Telecom acquired a controlling stake in 2012.
The company is also expanding its U.S. footprint.
SK Hynix is building its first U.S. production facility, a $4 billion advanced chip packaging plant in West Lafayette, Indiana, which is scheduled for completion in 2028. The project is expected to receive up to $458 million in funding under the U.S. CHIPS and Science Act and could qualify for up to $570 million in Commerce Department loans.
The company is also expanding Solidigm, its NAND flash memory business acquired from Intel in 2021 for $9 billion, which is headquartered in Rancho Cordova, California.
The AI-driven surge has lifted the broader memory industry, with strong demand pushing up prices for both advanced and conventional memory chips used in smartphones, personal computers, automobiles and data centres.
More than three-quarters of SK Hynix’s revenue comes from DRAM products, including HBM, while the company is also a leading supplier of NAND flash memory.
Annual revenue nearly tripled between 2023 and 2025 to about $65 billion, and analysts polled by LSEG expect sales to more than triple again in 2026 to roughly $235 billion.
To meet rising demand, SK Hynix plans to invest up to $720 billion in South Korea to expand AI memory production.
The largest project is a chip manufacturing cluster in Yongin, south of Seoul, expected to cost about $390 billion. The company has accelerated the timetable, with four fabrication plants now due to be completed by 2033. It is also expanding facilities in Cheongju and developing another manufacturing cluster in southwestern South Korea.
The expansion will require significant purchases of extreme ultraviolet (EUV) lithography systems, essential for manufacturing advanced chips. The machines, produced exclusively by Dutch company ASML, can cost as much as $400 million each. SK Hynix plans to spend about $7.8 billion on EUV equipment by the end of 2027.
“If you go to Korea they are building lots of fabs,” said MS Hwang, research director at Counterpoint. “But it takes time. The earliest time frame that they can bring out manufactured wafers is end of 2027.”
Industry analysts caution that memory chips remain a cyclical business, with previous demand booms often followed by sharp price declines. However, major memory suppliers, including SK Hynix, Samsung Electronics and Micron, are increasingly relying on long-term supply agreements to improve visibility over future demand.
“These agreements typically require customers to provide longer-term demand visibility,” Wang said, allowing SK Hynix to plan its spending with more confidence.
Daniel Newman, an analyst at Futurum Group, said investors should remain mindful of the industry’s history.
“This is how memory always acts in any megacycle or supercycle,” Newman said. “The problem is, it always crashes hard.”
Still, analysts say AI workloads continue to require ever-larger amounts of memory, with supply expected to remain constrained until at least 2027.
The demand is attracting customers from around the world, according to Hwang.
“Everybody is coming,” he said, referring to companies seeking long-term supply agreements.
Hwang said hotels near South Korea’s semiconductor hubs are “fully booked” as cloud computing companies and chipmakers “are all lining up to sign a long-term contract.”
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