Samsung Electronics on Thursday unveiled a 11.3 trillion won ($9.9 billion) share buyback after reporting its first on-year profit growth in two years thanks to strong sales of its Semiconductor Business and the Display Panel segment. Samsung said it would cancel all shares purchased through the buyback, its biggest to date, and planned to give shareholders 30 percent to 50 percent of its free cash flow over the next three years, primarily through dividends.

The company said third-quarter operating profit jumped 82 percent to 7.4 trillion won ($6.5 billion), in line with its guidance. Revenue rose 8.9 percent from a year earlier to 51.7 trillion won.

In the fourth quarter, the company expects earnings to decline from the earlier quarter, as it does not expect the foreign exchange rate to have a positive effect in the fourth quarter.

Samsung saw a significant increase in sales of smartphones in the quarter, compared with the second quarter with increased shipments of Galaxy Note5, Galaxy S6 Edge+ and the Galaxy A and J series. Its IM division posted KRW 26.61 trillion won in consolidated revenue and KRW 2.40 trillion in operating profit for the quarter.

The company will focus on maintaining a profit level similar to the previous quarter by expanding product sales for each price segment that were introduced in the third quarter.

Once again, the chip division was the company's top earner , with a record 3.66 trillion won profit thanks in part to demand from smartphone makers.

Although the memory market in the fourth quarter is expected to see slower seasonality compared with the previous years, Samsung expected that there will be steady demand due to the increased adoption of new interface products such as DDR4, LPDDR4, storage increase in smartphones, and higher penetration of SSDs.

For DRAM, Samsung will continue to expand its 20-nm process migration and actively respond to demand for high value-added products. For NAND, the company will continue to expand the 10-nm class migration and increase the supply of SSD with third-generation V-NAND.

In the third quarter, revenue for the System LSI business improved QoQ driven by the initial supply of 14nm foundry products and solid demand for LSI products such as CMOS image sensors.

In 2016, the System LSI business will focus on diversifying customer base and product line-ups based on its 14-nm process technology.

Samsung's Display Panel segment posted KRW 7.49 trillion in consolidated revenue and KRW 930 billion in operating profit for the quarter. For LCDs, despite a slowdown in demand and a decline in the average sales price (ASP), the company registered solid revenues thanks to an increase in shipments due to the trend toward larger size and high resolution TV.

Although the LCD panel market in 2016 is expected to face tough market conditions, Samsung Electronics will focus on improving cost competitiveness and inventory management.

For OLED panels, earnings increased QoQ due to the release of new high-end smartphone panels for major customers, expansion of the customer base, and higher operation ratio and the company will continue to focus on improving cost competitiveness and reinforce mid-low end line up next quarter. Although the smartphone market in 2016 is expected to slow down YoY, the company plans to diversify its product line up and continue to expand its customer base.

Additionally, the Display Panel segment will develop new products to secure new growth engines. To this end, we will seek new applications including transparent and mirror displays, along with head-mounted and automotive display among many others.