Korea's top two chipmakers, Samsung Electronics Co. and SK hynix Inc., accounted for a whopping 41 percent of all investments made by the country's major conglomerates in 2017, industry data showed Wednesday.

According to the research conducted by industry tracker CEO Score, 341 affiliates of the country's top 57 business groups invested a combined 85.9 trillion won ($80 billion), rising 35.2 percent from a year earlier.

Investments in facilities and other tangible properties jumped 40.6 percent over the cited period to 77.9 trillion won, with expenditures on non-tangible assets edging down 1.2 percent to 8 trillion won. Spending on research and development projects was not included in the study.

Industry watchers said the sharp increase came amid a boom in the world's chip market, leading to the expanded investments by Samsung and SK hynix, which spent 26.4 trillion won and 9.05 trillion won, respectively.

Samsung Electronics' investments doubled in 2017 from a year earlier, while that of SK hynix advanced 54.6 percent, the latest data showed.

By conglomerate, No. 1 Samsung Group accounted for 33.9 percent, or 29.1 trillion won, of the combined investments made by conglomerates. SK Group followed with 13.6 trillion won, with LG Group also spending 11.1 trillion won.

Hyundai Motor Group, on the other hand, saw its investments fall 7.6 percent on-year in 2017 to 7.6 trillion won.(Yonhap)