Samsung’s FACTORY has caught fire and smartphone batteries are being blamed for the blaze
Incident at South Korean firm's factory follows a global recall of the fire-prone Galaxy S7
A FIRE has broken out a Samsung factory in China.
The fire broke out at a facility northern Chinese city of Tianjin earlier today and it has now been extinguished, a Samsung spokesman said.
There were no casualties or significant impact to the plant's operations.
The fire broke out not on the production line itself but in a part of the facility used for waste, including faulty batteries, said Samsung SDI spokesman Shin Yong-doo. He added that most of the factory was running as normal.
The local fire department, however, said on its microblog that the fire was caused by batteries inside the facility.
The "material that caught fire was lithium batteries inside the production workshops and some half-finished products", the Wuqing branch of the Tianjin Fire Department said in a post on its verified Sina Weibo account. It added it had sent out 110 firefighters and 19 trucks to put out the fire.
SDI is set to start supplying batteries for Samsung's upcoming flagship smartphone Galaxy S8 in the first quarter of this year.
The S8 replaces the Galaxy Note 7 mode, which suffered a global recall last year due to battery defects.
The Tianjin plant is one of five production centres operated by SDI in China and a major one for small batteries used in phones.
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