SK Hynix is reportedly in talks to buy the Ohio chip campus Intel keeps delaying

By Mia Park · Korea Desk · July 21, 2026, 7:48 PM ET

Key points

SK Hynix is reportedly in talks to buy Intel's stalled Ohio chip campus, sized for up to 8 factories.
Intel budgeted about $28 billion for phase one, then pushed the opening back to 2030 and 2031.
SK Group chairman Chey Tae-won wants plants "not just in Honam but in America too."

SK Hynix (SKHY) is in talks to buy the half-built Intel (INTC) chip campus in Ohio and use it to start making its own memory chips in the United States, according to an exclusive report published Wednesday in Seoul by JoongAng Ilbo, one of Korea's largest newspapers. The goal, per the report, is US production within five years. Nothing is signed yet. Internal reviews and government approvals are still underway, and the price has not been settled.

A campus built for eight factories, and none of them finished

Intel broke ground on the Ohio site in New Albany back in 2022 and described it at the time as a future center of American chipmaking. The land covers roughly 1,000 acres (1.2 million pyeong in the Korean reporting on this deal), large enough to eventually hold eight separate fabrication buildings. Intel originally budgeted close to $28 billion just for the first phase, with a full buildout that could reach $100 billion over a decade.

None of that has opened yet. Intel has pushed the completion date back more than once. The first building is now not expected to start production until 2030 or 2031, five to six years later than the original 2025 target.

Why Intel might actually sell

The delays line up with a manufacturing business that keeps losing money. Intel Foundry, the company's chip manufacturing arm, lost $10.3 billion in 2025 on $17.8 billion of revenue, then lost another $2.4 billion in the first quarter of 2026 alone. A half-built campus that generates no revenue is an expensive thing to keep sitting on while the rest of the business tries to turn a profit.

The two companies already know each other. Intel hired away Lee Seok-hee, SK Hynix's former CEO, in June to help run its own packaging business, a detail that makes a straight sale between them a little less surprising.

Chey Tae-won's case for building in America

Chey Tae-won, the chairman of SK Group, is quoted in the report making the case plainly. "Memory chip prices are abnormally high right now. We need to expand supply to bring them down. We need factories not just in Honam, but in America too," he said.

The Honam reference is not random. SK Hynix and Samsung Electronics have already committed roughly 800 trillion won (close to $530 billion) to a new chip cluster in Korea's own Honam region. Chey had already hinted a US site was possible under the right conditions. He told Herald Business something close to this on July 13, more than a week before the Ohio report: if conditions are met, there is no reason not to build in the US.

Washington has been asking for this too

US Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick said on July 9, at a groundbreaking for a Micron plant in Clay, New York, that he wants to bring Samsung and SK Hynix to the United States and have them build plants. He added that Micron's own expansion means its Asian rivals have no choice but to follow. Micron, the only major US-based memory maker, has said it will spend more than $250 billion on US fabs by 2035.

SK Hynix already has the money and the reasons

This would not be SK Hynix's first US commitment. The company is already spending $3.87 billion on an advanced packaging plant in West Lafayette, Indiana, aimed at full HBM production by late 2028. I wrote a couple of days ago about how much US demand for this stock has grown since its Nasdaq shares started trading, and the company just closed the largest foreign IPO in US history, raising $26.5 billion. Roughly 65% of SK Hynix's first quarter revenue (about 34 trillion won, close to $22.7 billion) already comes from the US market. That is a lot of reason to want a factory closer to its biggest customers instead of shipping everything across the Pacific.

None of this is final. A deal this size still needs a price and a signed agreement. Regulators on both sides have to sign off too. But an Intel site that has sat mostly empty for years, next to a Korean company that just raised billions of dollars and has been publicly told by Washington to build here, is not a hard match to understand. Chey already told investors earlier this month to stop watching the stock price and just hold it. This is the kind of long-term move that comment was about.

Sources

Figures in this piece are sourced from JoongAng Ilbo's reporting on the talks, Intel's own construction and earnings disclosures, and South Korean and US financial media as linked above, converted to US dollars at roughly 1,500 won to the dollar where a won figure is the original source number. This is not investment advice.

Frequently asked questions

Is SK Hynix actually buying Intel's Ohio factory?

Not yet. A JoongAng Ilbo report says SK Hynix (SKHY) is in talks to buy Intel's (INTC) unfinished Ohio chip campus. The price and timing are still under negotiation, and government approvals on both sides are still pending.

Why does Intel's Ohio campus still sit unfinished?

Intel broke ground on the roughly 1,000 acre New Albany, Ohio site in 2022 but has delayed the first factory's opening more than once. It is now expected to start production in 2030 or 2031, five to six years later than originally planned, while Intel's foundry business lost $10.3 billion in 2025.

Why would SK Hynix want a factory in the US?

About 65% of SK Hynix's revenue already comes from the US market, and the company just raised $26.5 billion in the largest foreign IPO in US history. Building memory chips closer to its biggest customers also matches public pressure from US Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick, who has urged Samsung and SK Hynix to build American factories.

What did SK Group chairman Chey Tae-won say about it?

Chey Tae-won said memory chip prices are abnormally high and that supply needs to expand, adding that SK Hynix needs factories not just in Korea's Honam region but in America too, according to the JoongAng Ilbo report.

Mia Park · Korea Desk

Mia Park was born and raised in Korea and covers its markets and news for AIStockWire, from the Kospi to Samsung and SK Hynix. She got her start writing for a Korean entertainment blog, a long way from stock filings, but she has always liked knowing what is happening back home before anyone else does.