The South Korean government announced a public-private investment of ₩800 trillion, approximately $520 billion, to establish a new semiconductor hub in the Gwangju and Jeonnam region. The project will be located on the site of the former Gwangju Air Base within the Jeonnam-Gwangju Integrated Special City.
Samsung Electronics and SK hynix are the primary partners for the initiative. Each company is expected to construct two memory chip fabrication plants, resulting in a total of four facilities. The initial scale of the project is planned to be approximately two-thirds of the size of the existing SK hynix complex in Yongin.
President Lee Jae-myung identified water, renewable energy, land, and labor as key strategic advantages for the new location. The development is intended to alleviate resource constraints currently affecting the Seoul metropolitan area and to distribute economic growth more broadly across the country.
Corporate support for the project is already underway, with SK Group Chairman Chey Tae-won visiting the site on October 9, 2026, to emphasize the need for accelerated construction. The timeline includes site preparation in 2027, a potential construction start in 2028, and the commencement of mass production by June 2030.
