Korean Media: [Editorial] How Can Samsung Semiconductor Maintain Its Global Leadership?

Samsung Electronics once faced a potential full-scale strike, narrowly avoiding it through a temporary labor-management agreement. While the immediate crisis has passed, the looming aftermath is no less serious. Beneath the facade of a "national flagship enterprise," internal problems and a culture of workplace complacency have been exposed. The principle that "reward follows achievement" has been broken, and self-interest is beginning to erode organizational cohesion. The rare presence of labor unions among global semiconductor companies, combined with unchecked greed and selfishness among union members, along with management's unprincipled responses, raises serious concerns: how can Samsung sustain its current dominant position in the fiercely competitive global market if these issues remain unaddressed?

According to corporate law, profit distribution falls under the inherent authority of the shareholders' meeting and is determined by management. This incident has set a dangerous precedent: labor unions using strikes as leverage to force profit distribution. If this continues, the astronomical sums allocated for research and development (R&D) and capital investment—critical to Samsung’s survival—will be consumed. The long-term consequences remain uncertain, but in the semiconductor industry, missing out on forward-looking large-scale investments means rapid obsolescence.

Union members have openly threatened to destroy the company. Even before the strike was confirmed, many employees had already taken leave according to the strike schedule, some even booking overseas travel. There are rumors that the six-day voting period for the provisional agreement was deliberately scheduled to wait for union members returning from vacation.

Internal conflicts between business divisions have become a new challenge for Samsung. Profitable finished-product (DX) division staff receive only about 6 million KRW (~27,000 CNY) in company stock, while storage department employees can receive up to 600 million KRW (~2.7 million CNY) in performance bonuses—creating significant disparities and a deep sense of injustice within the organization.

Bloomberg described the situation at Samsung as: "This is not a traditional labor-management dispute over survival, but rather a struggle between 'the haves' and 'the have-mores' over the spoils of the AI boom." Foreign investors are now viewing Samsung’s workers demanding record-breaking bonuses—and the company itself—with a different lens.

Global competitors like NVIDIA and TSMC operate strict, individual-performance-based compensation systems offering high risk and high reward. Meanwhile, Samsung’s unions seek both the stability of traditional Korean-style union privileges and Silicon Valley-level bonuses. How sustainable is such a contradiction? And if it becomes unsustainable, will unions be willing to relinquish their privileges? Once the precedent of high performance bonuses spreads from Samsung’s domestic operations to its overseas production bases in the U.S., Europe, and India, the company may face overwhelming burdens.

Workers organized into a union, demanding a 600-million-KRW bonus and threatening strike action, have triggered national economic turmoil—yet ordinary citizens must bear the anxiety. Given Samsung’s current internal state, such absurdity is unlikely to end here. First, the government must abandon its one-sided favoritism toward labor unions. Samsung’s current union can no longer be considered a legitimate labor organization. It must be stopped from further undermining Korea’s economic cornerstone.

Source: Chosun Ilbo

Original Article: toutiao.com/article/1865861229382656/

Disclaimer: The views expressed in this article are those of the author(s).