Since Samsung’s lower-than-expected third quarter earnings and its apology for it, there is increasing concern that the tech giant’s chip business is facing a crisis.
Amid this climate, there are more and more cases being reported where Samsung semiconductor engineers are moving to competitors or government-backed research institutes, causing speculations on whether there is an “exodus” of Samsung employees jumping ship or it is just a temporary phenomenon in a conglomerate already known for its relative high turnover among domestic companies.
Sources told TheElec that in a recent SK Hynix job posting looking for three experienced etching engineers, around 200 engineers currently employed at Samsung applied.
This means that most of Samsung’s engineers working in its fab lines that qualified for the job applied, the sources said. They also said the information was shared widely in the industry as it was highly unusual for so many Samsung applicants to do so.
Samsung engineers with relatively little experience are also transferring more to SK Hynix, which runs a program that recruits chip engineers with less than five years of experience.
The program, called Junior Talent, was previously offered to those with less than three years of experience but SK Hynix widened the pool to five and counted Master's and PhD studies as experiences as well.
Sources said following this change, those applying for the program from Samsung surged.
Meanwhile, the Korea Electronics Technology Institute recently made a job posting looking for three researchers. The posting attracted around 50 doctoral-level engineers from Samsung’s chip business, they also said. Additionally, eight recently hired employees by KETI were all from Samsung as well, they added.
Last month, in a town hall meeting between executives and employees, a Samsung employee asked whether the company had a solution for securing and retaining talents. Samsung memory boss Lee Jung-bae told them to work hard and asked them to encourage those thinking of leaving to stay.
Samsung’s annual salary to employees in the past was the industry’s highest but today only with bonuses are their salary a little better than their competitor’s, a former Samsung Semiconductor employee told TheElec.