Bangalore: Samsung Group has raised its investments to $41.4 billion this year by concentrating on Organic Light Emitting Diode (OLED) displays and logic chips, reports Economic Times.

Samsung has planned on a 47.8 trillion KRW (about $41.4 billion) investment in 2012. Out of the 47.8 trillion KRW, Samsung intends to spend 31 trillion KRW in capital investment. This amount is 11 percent higher than that of last year. Samsung Electronics will provide 80 percent or 25 trillion KRW of the capital spending. Analysts say that investments in system chips will reach 7.5 trillion KRW this year. The investments made in system chips in 2011 were 1 trillion KRW less than this year. Also, OLED investments will increase from 5 trillion KRW in 2011 to 7 trillion KRW in 2012. Samsung Electronics’ market value increased by 0.6 percent, with an estimated market value of nearly $144 billion.

Despite slow growth in global IT sector and dismal economic condition of the world, Samsung has decided to cash in on OLED displays and logic chips used in computer memory chips, flat-screen LCD TVs and flash chips. This is a bold step by Samsung at present because other electronics firms are going for safer investments now. Lee Sun-tae, Analyst at NH Investment & Securities, said, "Samsung's got strong cash flow to make bold bets in new technologies. No other IT company can beat it in terms of investment and that's how Samsung finds new revenue sources ahead of rivals and widen its gap."

The Q-3 (ended September 30) results in 2011 of Samsung have been very fruitful. It had a consolidated profit of 41.27 trillion KRW, with a year-on-year increase of 3 percent. Its consolidated operating profit for Q-3 was 4.25 trillion KRW. LG, Samsung’s prime competitor, has reduced its investments by $3 billion in 2012 because of volatile world economies. LG has been in the red region for nearly 6 months now. The Q-3 (ended September 30) results of LG in 2011 have been dismal. LG had a consolidated revenue of 12.9 trillion KRW (nearly $11.92 billion) in Q-3 of 2011, a 4 percent fall from that of 2010. It had an operating loss of 32 billion KRW ($29.57 million) in 2011, when compared to a loss of 185 billion KRW ($156.12 million) in 2010. These losses were mostly due to loss of investments in affiliated firms and net financial expense.

With ready cash in its hand and innovative electronic products alluring tech-savvy customers, Samsung has a bright future ahead of it this year.