Samsung Electronics reported an over threefold surge in fourth-quarter profits on Thursday, hitting a new record and beating analysts' estimates, as a memory chip shortage and strong demand for artificial intelligence servers lifted earnings. The profits surpassed Samsung's long-standing record of 17.6 trillion won set in the third quarter of 2018, while matching Samsung's own guidance of around 20 trillion won. Samsung, South Korea's largest company by market capitalization, is a leading provider of memory chips, semiconductor foundry services and smartphones. Makers of AI chipsets, such as Nvidia, have been clamoring for limited supplies of HBM, with demand outpacing supply. This has been a boon for memory giants like Samsung as well as its rival SK Hynix, which reported record earnings on Wednesday.