South Korean tech giant Samsung is going beyond its popular smartphones and tablets. It is foraying into mining. Samsung won a $5.6 billion contract over the Easter weekend to develop Gina Rinehart's Roy Hill iron ore mining project in Western Australia.

Samsung is the largest South Korean company founded in 1938 as a trading firm by Lee Byung-chull but has expanded into food processing, textiles, insurance, securities, retail, ships and construction.

In a filing with the Korea Exchange, Samsung C&T said the final contract to build a process plant, railroad and harbor infrastructure will be signed by the end of April. Samsung C&T is the 72nd-largest construction company in the world.

Roy Hill Holdings is 70 per cent owned by Ms Rinehart, Australia's richest person, while the remaining 30 per cent is held by South Korean firms Posco and STX Group, Marubeni of Japan and China Steel of Taiwan.

Ahead of the agreement signing, Samsung said the construction will start next Tuesday, April 9 and is scheduled to end Nov 15, 2015.

Once the mine is full operations, it aims to produce 55 million tonnes of iron ore at its peak capacity which would make it the biggest Australian iron ore mine to emerge in decades. Its output would be about the same amount that Fortescue Metals shipped in the 2012 financial year.

However, if the project would finish the construction phases by late 2015, there is the risk that Roy Hill would sell iron ore at a permanently low-price environment.

Besides the Roy Hill venture, the Dugald River mine project proposed by China's MMG also took a step forward with the announcement of crucial contracting and funding deals.

The Dugald deal involves the development of new zinc, silver and lead mines in western Queensland, expected to be underwritten by up to $1billion financing from the China Development Bank.

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