SK Materials said it reported 461.4 billion won ($407.2 million) in sales and 154.1 billion won in operating profits in 2016, 36.5 percent and 36.6 percent jumps, respectively, from a year earlier.

Energy and telecom conglomerate SK Group has been beefing up its presence in the chipmaking sector by taking over Hynix Semiconductor Inc., currently SK hynix Inc., in 2011. In 2015, the group also bought OCI Materials, a local manufacturer of special gases used in chipmaking, LCD and solar panels.

SK Holdings also bought a 100 percent stake in SK Biotech, a manufacturer of raw materials for medicine, last year.

SK Holdings' unlisted subsidiary SK Biotech said its sales for 2016 breached the 100 billion-won mark for the first time since the company's foundation.

The company's operating profits also jumped 20 percent on-year to reach 29.4 billion won, officials said.

"The company aims to build more factories as the amount of orders received has exceed the amount of production every year," an SK Biotch official said.

The stake purchase by SK Holdings also comes as SK Group has been putting forward efforts to nurture its biomedicine and pharmaceutical businesses in a bid to secure new growth engines for the future. (Yonhap)