IT Sector Adds Over 10,000 Jobs in Past Year

Published on 2017/11/19 | Source

Over 10,000 jobs have been created in the IT sector in Korea in the past year, thanks to a boom in the semiconductor and display markets.

Major IT manufacturers including Samsung Electronics, SK Hynix, LG Display, LG Innotek and Samsung Display created nearly 9,000 new jobs as of the end of September, according to the Financial Supervisory Service on Wednesday.

The figure is likely to be over 10,000 when counting the new jobs in related equipment and materials businesses.

Samsung Electronics, which posted an operating profit of W11 trillion in the third quarter of this year alone, saw its employee count in the semiconductor and device solution divisions rise by some 4,250 from a year earlier to 48,660 (US$1=W1,113).

The increase coincided with the opening of a new memory chip plant in Pyeongtaek, Gyeonggi Province in July. The plant is the world's largest production line exclusively built for semiconductors. Overall, the electronics giant added 4,460 new workers.

SK Hynix hired 1,120 more people in the past year to total over 23,000. LG Display added 912 more employees.

An LG spokesman said, "With the beginning of the full-on production of OLED panels this year, we hired more research and development staff and workers on production lines".

LG Innotek also had 2,310 new workers to reach over 11,000 in total as the company expanded the supply of camera modules to Apple and other smartphone makers.