Chip industry relieved at deferred disclosure of Samsung’s workplace reports

South Korea’s semiconductor businesses on Wednesday welcomed deferred disclosure of Samsung Electronics’ assessment reports on workplace environments, although a legal battle between Samsung and the government will continue as scheduled.

Samsung has won support from the Ministry of Industry, Trade and Energy in its claim that workplace reports should not be made public as they contain key technologies and trade secrets, Tuesday.

The tech titan’s claim to nullify the Ministry of Employment and Labor’s decision to reveal the reports has also been partially accepted by the Central Administrative Appeals Commission.

The Employment Ministry had been moving to disclose the reports on Samsung’s major chip plants in Gyeonggi Province by Thursday at the earliest upon petitions made by a local cable news company and some civil activists.

The commission ordered to defer the disclosure, saying it needs time to review the case before making a final judgment, which could take several months.

The expert panel at the Industry Ministry concluded that Samsung’s assessment reports from 2009 to 2017 at its semiconductor factories contain “key national technologies” including 30-nanometer DRAM chip, NAND flash, application processor and assembling technology that need protection from public disclosure.

Reports from 2007 to 2008, meanwhile, do not contain such key information deemed national technologies, the panel judged.

Samsung had requested confirmation of the government’s protection for the content of the workplace reports written from 2007 through 2017.

“Both decisions -- the Industry Ministry’s and the Appeals Commission -- were made as expected,” said an industry official.

“Fallout from disclosing the Samsung reports will be huge across the industry. We are temporarily relieved but need to pay attention to how the main trail will go.”

Samsung is planning to use the panel’s judgment to stop the Employment Ministry’s move to disclose the reports to the public at the court.

The company filed an administrative lawsuit against the ministry with Suwon District Court on April 2.

According to some Samsung officials, the ministry panel’s conclusion backs its claim that those reports do contain company secrets, which will be the key point of the legal dispute at the court.

“The conclusion that the 2009-2017 reports include information deemed key national technologies means that the reports carry such important content that we claim them as company secrets,” a Samsung official said.

The Suwon court is expected to rule on the suit Thursday due to urgency of the issue.

The legal battle between Samsung and the ministry had intensified upon a court’s ruling in February, which ordered Samsung make public the reports on its plant in Onyang, South Chungcheong Province, after the death of a former worker who was diagnosed with leukemia in 2014.

The Employment Ministry’s deliberation committee decided to allow disclosing the reports of all Samsung plants upon requests in order to guarantee the rights of workers to know and enhance their safety at workplaces.

The ministry said in a press release Wednesday that the workplace reports are crucial documents needed for proving industrial accident cases.

“We will watch how the trial goes, and expect Samsung to take measures to make lawful compensation for applicants of the industrial accident insurance,“ it said. 

By Song Su-hyun (song@heraldcorp.com)