According to local media reports, the electronics giant Samsung has already started production of ASIC chips designed for bitcoin mining.
The company, which owns one of the world's largest semiconductor manufacturing plants, completed ASIC chip development last year and began mass production this month.
Samsung is supplying its ASIC chips to an unnamed Chinese company that produces bitcoin mining equipment and is aiming to target the Chinese market, possibly expanding to other regions.
A Samsung spokesman confirmed to a media agency in Seoul that "we are providing foundry for a virtual currency mining company." He added that the company was not sure what the company's profitability would be.
The publication notes that Taiwan's TSMC is currently the only major semiconductor manufacturer that has a similar relationship with Bitmain, the bitcoin mining hardware maker. A DigiTimes report states that Bitmain's chip orders account for 90% of TSMC's foundry capacity during off-peak hours.
Although the report does not explain the hardware manufacturers Samsung and Samsung are working with, it is likely to provide the company the ability to expand its business and challenge Bitmain's dominant market share.
Last year, Samsung created a Bitcoin mining rig using 40 old Galaxy phones as part of a "high recovery" program designed to convince customers to find new use cases for their old phones. Of course, this rig is more curious than the actual usage of outdated mobile devices, but it is an interesting development given that Samsung was secretly developing ASIC chips.
It is worth noting that Samsung is not the first large company to enter the bitcoin mining industry. Earlier this month, Eastman Kodak announced that it has licensed its name to mining hardware makers producing Kodak brand miners. The plan was harshly criticized because of its optimism - some said it was a fraudulent profit forecast and stipulated that Kodak would receive half of all the coins mined by these devices.