Industry sources revealed on Sunday that Samsung Electronics Co., Ltd. is expected to regain its position as the world's top DRAM supplier by revenue in the fourth quarter, surpassing domestic rival SK Hynix.

The sources indicated that the South Korean tech giant is projected to achieve over KRW 18 trillion (approximately $12.2 billion) in operating profit for the October-December period, exceeding market expectations.

Samsung's Device Solutions division, which oversees its semiconductor business, is anticipated to contribute KRW 15.1 trillion in operating profit—a staggering 422% year-on-year increase.

This stronger-than-expected performance positions Samsung to overtake SK Hynix in Q4 global DRAM revenue rankings, relegating the latter to second place.

Samsung had dominated the DRAM market for 33 consecutive years before losing its lead to SK Hynix in Q1 2024 due to lagging competitiveness in high-bandwidth memory (HBM) chips.

SK Hynix became the first company to develop HBM technology in 2013. These chips are critical components for AI applications, and SK Hynix has since maintained dominance in the global HBM market.

Analysts note that Samsung has been narrowing the technological gap in HBM while benefiting from rising prices of conventional DRAM products, driven by AI infrastructure investments like data centers.

Market research firm DRAMeXchange reported that the average price of 8Gb DDR4 memory for PCs surged 15.7% month-on-month to $8.1 in November.

Since March ($1.35), prices have skyrocketed sixfold, with Q4 prices projected to rise up to 50% quarter-on-quarter.