Samsung Electronics says first-quarter operating profit up 48 percent year-on-year

SEOUL (Reuters) - Strong memory chip earnings propelled tech giant Samsung Electronics Co Ltd <005930.KS> to its best quarterly profit in more than 3 years, the South Korean firm said on Thursday as its first-quarter results matched its earlier guidance.

Samsung said in a regulatory filing its January-March operating profit was 9.9 trillion won ($8.75 billion), compared with 9.9 trillion won it estimated earlier in April.

Revenue rose 2 percent to 50.5 trillion won, also in line with its earlier estimate.

(Reporting by Hyunjoo Jin and Se Young Lee; Editing by Stephen Coates)