Workers at tech giant Samsung Electronics in South Korea staged the company’s first strike on Friday, the head of a major union representing tens of thousands of people told AFP.
Samsung Electronics is one of the world’s largest smartphone manufacturers and also one of the only companies worldwide to produce high-tech memory chips used to create artificial intelligence, including leading AI hardware from industry leaders such as Nvidia.
Management at the company, the world’s largest maker of memory chips, has been locked in wage negotiations with the union since January, but the two sides have been unable to narrow their differences.
“The first strike at Samsung Electronics is taking place today through the use of paid leave and it is understood that many workers are participating,” said Son Woo-mok, head of the National Samsung Electronics Union.
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“It’s hard to give an exact number, but from what I’ve seen of attendance at the workplace in the morning, there is a significant difference from the usual,” he added.
Samsung Electronics said it is “diligently engaged in negotiations with the union and will continue to do so.”
“There is no impact on production and business activities. The paid leave utilization rate on June 7 is lower than June 5 last year,” which, like Friday, was between a holiday and a weekend, the company said in a statement .
The strike in South Korea is the first walkout by the tech giant’s workers.
About 10 workers staged a protest in front of Samsung’s main offices in Seoul on Friday, chanting: “Respect labor! We don’t want a 6.5 percent raise or a 200 percent bonus!”
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Samsung Electronics is the flagship of South Korean giant Samsung Group, by far the largest of the family-controlled conglomerates that dominate business in Asia’s fourth-largest economy.
Taiwan-based market research firm TrendForce said the strike will not affect DRAM and NAND Flash production, nor cause shipment shortages.
Samsung accounts for a significant chunk of the world’s production of high-end chips, but the strike affects headquarters employees, not workers on production lines, TrendForce said.
Additionally, it’s only a one-day strike and falls during a long-planned holiday period in South Korea, meaning the company would like to have already adjusted expected staffing levels.
“Finally, fabs rely heavily on automated production and require minimal human labor. Therefore, the strike will not have a material impact on future memory supply,” TrendForce said in a report.
Historic strike
Still, the strike has historical significance, “since Samsung has resisted unionization and participated in union-busting for so long,” Vladimir Tikhonov, a professor of Korean studies at the University of Oslo, told AFP.
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He said the collective action showed that “there is a gradual trend toward labor empowerment in South Korea.”
Samsung Electronics avoided unionizing its workers for nearly 50 years — sometimes using brutal tactics, critics say — as it rose to become the world’s biggest smartphone and semiconductor maker.
Samsung founder Lee Byung-chul, who died in 1987, was staunchly opposed to unions, saying he would never allow them “until I have dirt in my eyes.”
But in the late 2010s, organizers seized the opportunity presented by the leftist government of President Moon Jae-in — a former rights lawyer who represented labor unions — and the controversy surrounding the bribery trial of the company’s then-vice chairman Lee Jae -yong, grandson of the founder, to establish a union.
The National Samsung Electronics Union, which has about 28,000 members, or more than a fifth of the company’s total workforce, said the word “strike” was a “taboo word” at the tech giant.
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“We are firmly advocating that the company respect labor issues, stop oppressing unions and avoid making unilateral decisions on issues that are so closely related to workers,” union chief Sean told AFP.
Semiconductors are the lifeblood of the global economy, used in everything from kitchen appliances and mobile phones to cars and weapons.
It is South Korea’s top export and reached $11.7 billion in March, accounting for one-fifth of total exports, according to trade ministry data.
Lee Hyun-kook, vice president of the union, said the strike would not “lead to a stoppage of production, and we do not want it to lead to one.”
“We just want Samsung to hear our voice,” he told AFP.
Source: AFP