South Korea's SK Hynix said on Friday that its board had approved about 54.3 trillion won ($38.30 billion) of investments through 2031, including 35.2 trillion won for the second phase of construction ​of its chip fabrication plant in Yongin and 19.1 trillion won for its ​M17 chip plant in Cheongju.

In June, SK Hynix said it planned to invest ⁠600 trillion won in the Yongin semiconductor cluster and 100 trillion won to ​expand its production base in Cheongju, adding at the time that detailed investment plans and ​schedules would be disclosed after receiving board approval.

The company said Yongin's "Y2 fab" is the second of four fabrication plants planned for the cluster and will serve as a production base for dynamic ​random access memory (DRAM) chips.

DRAM, which temporarily stores data for processors, is a critical ​component in the servers powering the AI boom.

Construction is scheduled to begin in July next year, ‌with ⁠the first cleanroom expected to open in June 2029 to produce high-bandwidth memory (HBM) and other next-generation DRAM products. A cleanroom is a highly controlled manufacturing space that keeps dust and other microscopic contaminants out during the chipmaking process.

Meanwhile, the first-phase Yongin ​fab remains on track, ​with its first ⁠cleanroom scheduled to open in February next year, the company said in a statement.

Separately, SK Hynix said construction of the M17 ​fab in Cheongju, which will produce NAND flash memory used ​to store ⁠data in devices ranging from personal computers to AI servers, is scheduled to begin in February next year, with its first cleanroom expected to open in December 2028.

In a ⁠separate ​regulatory filing, the company said it was "actively reviewing" ​additional shareholder return measures to enhance shareholder value and expects to finalise and announce details in the third ​quarter. (Reuters, 2026-08-07)