South Korea's industry ministry on Thursday vowed to make all-out efforts to overcome existing hurdles in the chip industry, which has been struggling with a cyclical downturn and sluggish global demand.

South Korea's SK Hynix Inc has started using a high-tech material from a Korean supplier in its chipmaking process, a company official said on Wednesday, shifting away from a Japanese product for the first time.

I'm standing inside Samsung Digital City, where some 35,000 employees work, eat, play, and work some more in Suwon, South Korea.

South Korea's exports tumbled in August for a ninth consecutive month, on sluggish demand from its biggest buyer, China, and depressed prices of computer chips globally, government data showed on Sunday.

Japan's curbs on exports of high-tech materials to South Korea could backfire in the long run, eroding its dominance over a key link in the global chip supply chain, suppliers and experts say.

South Korea's top court on Thursday ordered a retrial of Samsung's de facto leader Lee Jae-yong, reigniting a bribery case that could send the technology heir back to prison.

Semiconductor sales fell 30 per cent, while exports to China fell 20 per cent, suggesting joint headwinds of global electronics slowdown and US-China trade war

Japan has approved shipments of a high-tech material to South Korea for the second time since imposing export curbs last month, two sources said, ahead of talks by government officials this week to resolve a dispute stemming from their wartime past.

South Korea is removing Japan from a list of trusted trading partners, escalating a dispute with its neighbor that is already disrupting the global supply chain for big tech companies.

Japan has approved shipment of a high-tech material to South Korea for the first time since imposing export curbs last month, but doubled down on political pressure and warned it could broaden restrictions on deliveries to its Asian neighbor.

Japan will remove South Korea from its list of trusted trade partners, deepening a bitter row between the two countries.

Trade wars are continuing to prompt Apple to rethink some of its manufacturing and supply chain options, with the iPhone maker said to be examining the situation of an ongoing tiff between South Korea and Japan, one which could lead to Apple using China's BOE for future iPhone display panels.

Russia is offering to supply etching gas to South Korea, in a move that could help Seoul get around Japanese restrictions on exports to its neighbor of the key element for semiconductor production.

While spot markets make up a small percentage of the memory chip market, Ike Cho, a Bernstein analyst, said the South Korean groups are pushing up prices as they negotiate contracts for the third quarter with their customers.

Russia suggested that it may be able to supply South Korean businesses with highly pure hydrogen fluoride (etching gas), one of the items subjected to recent export controls by the Japanese government, the Hankyoreh has learned.

South Korean president Moon Jae-in urged Japan to withdraw new restrictions on exports in his first public remarks on a dispute that erupted last week and has intensified animosity between the two countries.

Japan's tightening of controls on the export of semiconductor materials to South Korea could hit Samsung's production hard.

Japan tightened controls on exports to South Korea in an unexpected blow to the global technology supply chain that also marks a new low point in relations between the two US allies.

Nvidia Korea chief Yoo Eung-joon said that its production of advanced GPUs will be conducted by Samsung Electronics with its 7-nanometer extreme ultraviolet process.

The UK and South Korea have signed in principle a free trade agreement (FTA) that seeks to maintain existing trade arrangements post-Brexit.

South Korea aims to rise to an unrivaled position in both memory and non-memory semiconductor industry by 2030, President Moon Jae-in said Tuesday as he visited a Samsung facility, unveiling a set of policy measures worth over KRW1 trillion (US$860 million) to support industry players.

South Korea's semiconductor export volume dropped 12 percent from the previous quarter in the first three months of this year on sluggish global demand, central bank data showed Wednesday.

KT has secured 100,000 5G subscribers, putting it ahead of SK Telecom and LG Uplus in the race to gain 5G subscribers.

China's vice premier said Friday that China will handle its antitrust probe into Samsung Electronics and SK hynix according to a fair procedure and in line with its laws, South Korea's finance ministry said.

According to the ministry, the state-run Korea Trade-Investment Promotion Agency will help local fabless and foundry firms find potential clients through their offices around the globe.

South Korea's antitrust regulator has lowered a decade-old penalty imposed on U.S. chipmaker Qualcomm by 18 percent to $200 million.

Responding to Korea's PumaX financial news service, Samsung said it has "officially denied that it has reviewed the acquisition of NXP," further noting that earlier reports that it is considering an NXP acquisition "are not true."

The M16 production line, located in Icheon, 80 kilometers southeast of Seoul, will be built on a 53,000-square meter lot.

Korea isn't standing still and allowing China to just catch up and take the lead. Samsung Electronics and SK Hynix have come up with a series of new products that they hope will widen the technological gap with their Chinese counterparts.

SK Hynix said it would invest 20 trillion won ($17.8 billion) in a new memory chip manufacturing plant opening on Thursday in South Korea.

The ban is being considered thanks to a patent-infringement claim by a company called KAIST, which claims that it has patented FinFET, a processor technology used by Apple in its A-series processors.

South Korea's Hanwha Q Cells' market share grew 2pp last year to 12.9%, becoming the first overseas producer to top Japan's solar panel market, according to a survey conducted by Nikkei, tapping demand for inexpensive residential products. Canadian Solar Japan and China's JinkoSolar also managed to increase their share.

Kim Jong-un has become the first North Korean leader to set foot in South Korea by crossing the military line that has divided the peninsula since the end of the Korean War in 1953. In a moment rich with symbolism and pomp, South Korean leader Moon Jae-in and Mr Kim shook hands at the border.

The company signed the preliminary agreement with South Chungcheong Province to invest some KRW480 billion (US$449 million) for the expansion of its plant in Cheonan, some 80 kilometers south of Seoul, for 300mm silicon wafer, the provincial government said.

According to the Korean Intellectual Property Office (KIPO), patents related to AI semiconductors, which was 32 in 2013, soared to 391 in 2017 in South Korea, a ten-fold increase over the four years.

The acquisition has now received 8 of the 9 approvals around the world, with China remaining.

LG U+ and Huawei have launched Seoul TechCity, a collaborative project that aims to deliver smart city capabilities for the Korean capital, including: Giga Everywhere, mobile enabled digitized industry infrastructure, and the ability to build ecosystems for a digital society.

Semiconductors are expected to account for a record high of more than 16% of South Korea's annual exports in 2017, data showed Friday.

LG Display and Huawei are expected to sign an agreement for the long-term and stable supply of small- and medium-size OLED panels at the top management meeting in Korea on Oct. 3.

Earlier this year, Elan Microelectronics partnered with smart card integrator Jinco Universal and KSID to develop smart cards with an embedded fingerprint sensor.