SEOUL, Oct. 14 (Xinhua) -- South Korea's export of information and communications technology (ICT) products hit a record monthly high thanks to strong semiconductor demand, government data showed Tuesday.

The ICT products shipment soared 14.0 percent from a year earlier to 25.43 billion U.S. dollars in September, keeping an upward trend since February, according to the Ministry of Trade, Industry and Energy.

The record figure was attributed to surging chip demand that offset uncertainty in the global trade environment.

Chip export spiked 21.9 percent to reach a new high of 16.62 billion dollars on solid demand for high-end products, such as double data rate 5 (DDR5) and high bandwidth memory (HBM) used in generative artificial intelligence (AI) chipsets.

Display panel shipment grew 1.3 percent to 1.92 billion dollars, but mobile phone export dropped 10.7 percent to 1.49 billion dollars.

Import of ICT products mounted 10.4 percent over the year to 13.78 billion dollars in September, sending the trade surplus in the ICT industry to 11.65 billion dollars. ■