Group wants to slim down, put SK people in Hynix to revamp




SK Hynix, the brainchild of SK Group’s highly publicized merger with Hynix Semiconductor this year, is expected to dismiss up to 20 percent of its executives within the next two months.

Industry sources said the dismissal rate could go up to as high as 30 percent when including some of the non-executive employees.

The sources said SK Hynix has been without an owner for too long, and had become too big and unwieldy for SK to cope with.

“Think about it. It has had no owner for a decade. It’s high time that the company made some restructuring efforts,” a source said, speaking on the condition of anonymity.

SK Hynix’s executive body consists of 58 men including SK Group chairman Chey Tae-won and presidents Kwon Oh-chul and Ha Sung-min. The rest are mostly deputy or vice president-level executives.

There had been earlier reports of SK Hynix undergoing restructuring to slim down. The company’s chief of corporate finance who came from the Hynix side was replaced by an SK executive and this further generated such rumors. This is because another rationale behind the scheduled reshuffling is to station more SK people in key posts.

SK Hynix denied plans for any such major shake-up, although regular personnel reshuffling is scheduled for the end of the year. 

On Wednesday, the company said its operating profit once again slipped into the red in the third quarter, recording a deficit of 15 billion won ($13.6 million). In the second quarter this year, SK Hynix had for the first time in three quarters recorded a profit. It had logged an operating loss of 237 billion won during the first half of the year, compared with the 769.7 billion won profit it registered in the same period last year.

The company’s ventures for acquiring overseas memory and NAND flash makers was seen as having put a strain on the company’s cash supply. SK Hynix also said that the loss from DRAM inventory loss eclipsed the gain from NAND flash sales.

SK Hynix currently has the fourth-largest share in the global market for NAND flash, a key component in smartphones. It also is the No. 2 supplier of DRAM chips, behind industry leader Samsung Electronics.

Despite its strong market presence and product development skills, the memory-chip maker was hit by sluggish DRAM prices, which have been sliding at an increasing rate since July this year.

Credit appraiser S&P, which has a BB-/Stable rating for SK Hynix, said earlier this month that while the company maintains a solid position in the global semiconductor memory market, its business risk profile is “weak” due to the “variability” in operating performance and capital intensity.

Regarding market conditions, it said the memory semiconductor industry is susceptible to overexpansion of capacity for DRAM and NAND flash, leading to further price declines and ultimately “erode the profitability of all market participants.”

Hynix’s need to continually make large capital expenditures is another factor that constrains the ratings, S&P said in its Oct. 19 statement.

By Kim Ji-hyun
(jemmie@heraldcorp.com)

<한글 기사>

SK 하이닉스, 임원 대거 퇴출될 듯

올해 출범한 SK 하이닉스의 구조조정설 난무하는 가운데, 연말 정기인사에 맞춰 약 12명 정도되는 임원이 퇴출될 것이라는 소식이 들려온다.

현재 SK 하이닉스는 최태원 회장과 SK 하이닉스 사장 권오철, 하성민 등을 포함해 58명의 등기, 미등기 임원이 있다. 그 중 약 5분의 1 가량이 퇴출될 것이라고 SK에 정통한 한 소식통이 전해왔다.

너무 오랜 세월 주인이 없던 탓에 덩치가 비대해지고, 업무 효율성 문제도 있다고 소식통은 전했다. 또, SK가 내부 사람을 하이닉스에 심을 때가 된 걸로 판단한 것으로 보인다고 또 다른 관계자가 전했다. 실제로 올해 상반기에 소위 "하이닉스 사람"이었던 CFO를 대신해 전 SK측 상무가 영입되어 활발히 활동 중이다.

부진한 실적도 구조조정을 앞당기는데 한몫하고 있는 것으로 전해지고 있다. 오늘 발표된 3분기 실적을 보면, SK 하이닉스는 또다시 영업이익 적자를 기록했다. 약 150억원으로, 작년대비해서는 적자폭이 줄었지만, 올해 전반기에만 SK 하이닉스는 2371 억원의 영업이익 적자를 냈다.

추락하는 디램 (DRAM)가격과 개발비용도 SK 하이닉스호의 구조조정을 앞당기고 있다고 관계자들은 전했다.

SK 하이닉스에 BB-/stable 등급을 매긴 S&P는 지난 19일에, SK 하이닉스는 여전히 굳건 (solid)한 기업이지만, 디램 가격이 우려된다고 밝혔다. 또, 기술개발을 위해 자본금을 계속 깎아 먹어야 하는 상황도 등급상향 조정을 막고 있는 요인이라고 했다.

SK 측은 구조조정 설이 나돌 때부터 대대적인 인사이동은 없을 것이라고 못박고 있다.



코리아헤럴드 김지현 기자
(jemmie@heraldcorp.com)