Samsung Electronics expects January-March profit to be its highest in three quarters. Operating profit likely reached 5.9 trillion won ($5.44 billion) in the first quarter, the South Korean manufacturer said on Tuesday.

This was better than 5.3 trillion won reported for October-December even though the first quarter tends to be a seasonally weaker.

Samsung's new Galaxy S6 and S6 edge models are going on sale from Friday and the company hopes to revive handset sales and propel profits in coming quarters.

But the contribution from Samsung's chip-making division is also tipped to be just as significant as smartphone-related income. Samsung dominates in memory and grew market share for system chips. The company has chosen to use more of its own chips for its Galaxy S6 models and has added Nvidia as a new contract manufacturing client.