SEOUL, South Korea - An electrical problem at a Samsung Electronics Co. factory Friday forced a partial halt in production at the world's largest memory chip maker, the company said.
A spark in an electrical transformer led to a power failure on six chip-making lines at a plant near Seoul, spokeswoman Lee Soo-jeong said. Five of the lines make memory chips and one makes chips for other functions, she said.
Samsung is the world's largest producer of memory chips for use in computers, digital music players and other devices.
Analysts said the suspension of Samsung's chip lines could lead to a shortage of NAND flash memory chips, which are able to retain data even when they are unpowered. Samsung's misfortune could give a boost to its South Korean rival Hynix Semiconductor Inc. and Japan's Toshiba Corp.
Lee said Samsung Electronics expects to have all the lines back up and running in one or two days. Total losses to the company from the shutdown will be about US$54 million, she said.
