The South Korean companies have established a strong presence in Vietnam, generating over 80 billion USD in revenue, which is twice the combined revenue of other electronic companies. Out of this amount, more than 70 billion USD comes from four Samsung factories, while three LG factories contribute over 10 billion USD.
LG Innotek Vietnam Hai Phong, the investor behind the camera module manufacturing plant of the same name, has recently received a certificate of additional investment registration worth 1 billion USD from the Hai Phong City People’s Committee. This raises the total investment capital of the project to over 2 billion USD.
LG Innotek is a member of the LG Group, a prominent South Korean conglomerate, which is increasingly solidifying its position in Hai Phong and transforming it into one of the world’s manufacturing hubs. Currently, the LG Group owns seven projects in the port city, with a total investment capital of nearly 10 billion USD.
In addition to consistent capital investment, the revenue scale of LG factories is also growing rapidly. For instance, LG Innotek Vietnam achieved a record-breaking revenue of nearly 3.4 billion USD last year. The first investment certificate for LG Innotek in Hai Phong was granted in 2016, with a registered capital of 550 million USD. In 2018, an additional investment of over 500 million USD was registered by a member of the LG Group, effectively doubling the project’s scale.
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In contrast, the revenue of LG Electronics Hai Phong, which specializes in electronic devices, peaked at 4.7 billion USD in 2020 but decreased to 3.5 billion USD in 2022. In 2021, LG Electronics announced the closure of its mobile phone production division in Vietnam due to inefficiency, which may have contributed to the decline.
Another notable player is LG Display Vietnam, a manufacturing plant focused on displays, which achieved a revenue milestone of 4.4 billion USD in 2020.
LG Electronics’ smartphone plant in Hai Phong, Vietnam
While the total revenue of factories in Vietnam has exceeded 10 billion USD in recent years, LG’s production scale remains relatively small compared to Samsung, the leading investor from South Korea in Vietnam. Samsung established its first factory in Bac Ninh in 2008 and has invested approximately 18 billion USD in Vietnam. Noteworthy Samsung factories include Samsung Thai Nguyen, Samsung Display Vietnam, Samsung Electronics Vietnam, and Samsung HCMC CE Complex. The combined revenue of these four factories in 2022 surpassed 71 billion USD.
The revenue of 80 billion USD generated by Samsung and LG is significant when compared to Vietnam’s total export value in the electronics industry, which reached nearly 120 billion USD in 2022. This industry comprises numerous large and small companies involved in computers, electronic products, phones, cameras, and components.
South Korea leads in foreign direct investment (FDI) capital in Vietnam, with an estimated 80 billion USD by the end of 2022, and this figure continues to rise. Samsung and LG are the two major representatives in the electronic device manufacturing sector. These two East Asian companies have chosen Vietnam as their base and are experiencing ongoing success. They have also committed to investing billions of USD in the future.