Seoul, May 11 (IANS) The largest labour union at Samsung Electronics on Monday reiterated its demand that the company allocate 15 per cent of operating profit to employee performance-based bonuses and remove the payout cap, warning that mediation efforts could collapse if no progress is made.

Choi Seung-ho, head of the union, reaffirmed the labor group’s position ahead of follow-up mediation talks aimed at averting the union’s planned 18-day strike beginning May 21, reports Yonhap news agency.

“We have continued to call for performance-based bonuses equivalent to 15 percent of operating profit, along with the removal of the payout cap and the institutionalisation of the system,” Choi told reporters ahead of the meeting at the National Labor Relations Commission in the central administrative city of Sejong.

“If the company does not present a position on institutionalising the scheme, we believe mediation efforts could break down as early as today,” he added. The talks began Monday and are scheduled to continue through Tuesday.

Last month, Samsung Electronics posted an operating profit of 57.23 trillion won for the first quarter, up from 6.68 trillion won a year earlier, driven by strong demand for high-end memory chips used in artificial intelligence applications, said the report.

Management and the labour union have been engaged in wage negotiations since December, but talks broke down in March after the two sides failed to narrow differences over performance-based bonuses.

The labour dispute at Samsung Electronics, the world’s largest memory chip maker and South Korea’s most valuable company, has raised concerns that a walkout could disrupt production and upend the semiconductor supply chain as well as hurt the broader economy as a whole, according to the report.

—IANS

na/