Samsung Electronics said on Wednesday it broke ground in China on a NAND flash memory chip factory in which it will invest a total of US$7 billion, its single largest investment in the country.
The factory will be located in Xi’an, China and will use a 10-nanometer manufacturing process to produce the NAND flash memory chips, which are often used to store data in smartphones, laptops and cameras.
The factory is slated to be fully operational in 2014, according to a Samsung statement. The company will initially invest $2.3 billion in the factory.
Samsung said the new factory will help balance its global production network, a year after it started operations at a NAND flash memory chip factory in Hwaseong, Korea.
While a major vendor of smartphones, The Korean company is also a producer of mobile components including processors and memory, with customers that include Apple. The iPhone and iPad maker however, reportedly reduced its memory chips orders from the company in order to diversify its supply lines.