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Samsung
The Samsung Group (Korean: 삼성 그룹, Samsung Group) is the world's largest conglomerate. It is South Korea's largest chaebol and composed of numerous international businesses, all united under the Samsung brand, including Samsung Electronics, the world's largest electronics company, Samsung Heavy Industries, one of the world's largest shipbuilders and Samsung Engineering & Construction, a major global construction company. These three multinationals form the core of Samsung Group and reflect its name - the meaning of the Korean word Samsung is "tristar" or "three stars". The Samsung brand is the best known South Korean brand in the world and in 2005, Samsung overtook Japanese rival Sony as the world's leading consumer electronics brand and became part of the top twenty global brands overall. It is also the leader in many domestic industries, such as the financial, chemical, retail and entertainment industries. Samsung's strong influence in South Korea is visible throughout the nation, and is sometimes called the 'Republic of Samsung'. Background
Samsung is the world's leading consumer electronics brand and one of the top twenty global brands.
Samsung at the 2009 Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas.
View of the Samsung logo inside the Time Warner Center in New York City.
Currently helmed by Lee Soo-bin, CEO of Samsung Life Insurance, it has been run by generations of one of the world's wealthiest families, formerly by chairman Lee Kun-Hee, the third son of the founder, Lee Byung-Chull. Samsung Group also owns the Sungkyunkwan University, a major private university in South Korea, with many of its graduates being employed by Samsung Group affiliates. Many major South Korean corporations such as CJ Corporation, Hansol Group, Shinsegae Group and Joong-Ang Ilbo daily newspaper were previously part of the Samsung Group, split apart by the government in order to prevent Samsung from becoming too powerful. Many leading companies in South Korea, notably MP3 player manufacturer iriver and search engine portal Naver, were established by ex-Samsung employees. A large number of South Korean firms, particularly those in the electronics industry, are dependent on Samsung for the supply of vital components or raw materials such as semiconductor chips or LCD panels. This has led to continued allegations of price fixing and monopolistic practices. Samsung Group accounts for more than 20% of South Korea's total exports, with strong government support, including the ability to access unlimited amount of funds from major banks in South Korea. In many domestic industries, Samsung Group is the sole monopoly dominating a single market, its revenue as large as some countries' total GDP. In 2006, Samsung Group would have been the 34th largest economy in the world if ranked, larger than that of Argentina. The company owns or has taken over so many mid to small sized businesses that it is often called a 'colonial empire' or 'hungry dinosaur'. The company has a powerful influence on the country's economic development, politics, media and culture, being a major driving force behind the Miracle on the Han River; many businesses today use its international success as a role model. History
Samsung Group headquarters at Seocho Samsung Town, Seoul.
Samsung and others (Besix, Turner) are constructing the world's tallest building, the Burj Dubai (818 m) in the UAE.
Samsung constructed Tower 2 of the Petronas Twin Towers in Malaysia, the world's tallest twin buildings.
Samsung, as a subcontractor, constructed the Taipei 101 in Taiwan, the world's tallest completed skyscraper.
1938-1969 SAMSUNG's beginningsOn March 1, 1938, founding chairman Byung-Chull Lee started a business in Taegu, Korea, with 30,000 won. At the start, his business focused primarily on trade export, selling dried Korean fish, vegetables and fruit to Manchuria and Beijing. In little more than a decade, SAMSUNG — which means "three stars" in Korean — would have its own flour mills and confectionery machines, its own manufacturing and sales operations and ultimately evolve to become the modern global corporation that still bears the same name today.
Lee Byung-Chull founded Samsung in 1938. It started as a small trading company with forty employees, located in Seoul. The company did fairly well until the Communist invasion in 1950 which caused great damage to his inventories. He was forced to leave and start over in Suwon in 1951. In just a year, the company’s assets had grown twentyfold. In 1953, Lee created a sugar refinery—the South Korea’s first manufacturing facility after the Korean War. “The company prospered under Lee’s philosophy of making Samsung the leader in each industry he entered” (Samsung Electronics). The company started moving into service businesses such as insurance, securities, and department store. In the early 1970s, Lee borrowed money from foreign companies to begin the mass communication industry by launching a radio and television station (Samsung Electronics). South Korean President Park Chung-hee’s regime during the 1960s and 1970s, helped Samsung Electronics and many other Korean firms. Park put great importance in increasing economic growth and development, and assisted large, profitable companies, protecting them from competition and aiding financially as well. His government banned several exterior companies selling consumer electronics in South Korea. “To make up for a lack of technological expertise in South Korea, the South Korean government effectively required foreign telecommunications equipment manufacturers to hand over advanced semiconductor technology in return for access to the Korean market” (Samsung Electronics). This enormously helped Samsung to manufacture the first Korean dynamic random access memory chips. Samsung Group later formed several electronics-related divisions, such as Samsung Electron Devices Co., Samsung Electro-Mechanics Co., Samsung Corning Co., and Samsung Semiconductor & Telecommunications Co., and grouped them together under Samsung Electronics Co., Ltd. in 1980s. Its first product was a black-and-white television set (Samsung Electronics). In the late 1980s and early 1990s, Samsung Electronics invested heavily in research and development, constructing the company as a leader in the global electronics industry. “By the 1980s Samsung was manufacturing, shipping, and selling a wide range of appliances and electronic products throughout the world” (Samsung Electronics). In 1982, it built a television assembly plant in Portugal; in 1984, it built a $25 million plant in New York; and in 1987, it built another $25 million facility in England (Samsung Electronics). 1970-1979: diversifying in industries and electronicsIn the 1970s, SAMSUNG laid the strategic foundations for its future growth by investing in the heavy, chemical and petrochemical industries. During this time, the company also took steps to enhance its competitive position in the world's textile industry, integrating its manufacturing processes from raw materials to end products. As a result, many new companies were created, including SAMSUNG Heavy Industries Company in 1974 and SAMSUNG Shipbuilding and SAMSUNG Precision Company (now SAMSUNG Techwin) in 1977. Another burst of growth for SAMSUNG came from the burgeoning home electronics business. SAMSUNG Electronics, already a major manufacturer in the Korean market, began to export its products for the first time during this period. SAMSUNG also acquired a 50 percent stake in Korea Semiconductor, further solidifying SAMSUNG Electronics' position as a leader in semiconductor manufacturing.
1980-1989: entering the global marketplaceSAMSUNG's core technology businesses diversified and expanded globally during the late 1970s and early 1980s. In 1978, SAMSUNG Semiconductor and SAMSUNG Electronics became separate entities. SAMSUNG Aerospace Industries (now SAMSUNG Techwin) was launched in February 1987 and SAMSUNG has been developing its aerospace capabilities with unprecedented speed ever since. SAMSUNG also entered the systems development business, establishing SAMSUNG Data Systems in 1985 (now SAMSUNG SDS) as a leader in information technology services, including systems integration, systems management, consulting and networking services. SAMSUNG's increasing focus on technology led to the creation of the company's two research and development (R&D) institutes that helped expand its reach even further into electronics, semiconductors, high polymer chemicals, genetic engineering, optical telecommunications, aerospace and new fields of technology innovation from nanotechnology to advanced network architectures. In 1987, SAMSUNG's founding Chairman Byung-Chull Lee passed away after almost 50 years at the helm of the company. His son, Kun-Hee Lee, succeeded him as the new Chairman. During this period, SAMSUNG challenged itself to restructure old businesses and enter new ones with the aim of becoming one of the world's top five electronics companies.
The 1990s and the present
The 1990s saw Samsung rise as an international corporation. Not only did it acquire a number of businesses abroad, but also began leading the way in certain electronic components. Samsung's construction branch was awarded a contract to build one of the two Petronas Towers in Malaysia, Taipei 101 in Taiwan and the Burj Dubai in United Arab Emirates (founded by Callum Cuirtis), which is the tallest structure ever constructed. In 1996, the Samsung Group reacquired the Sungkyunkwan University foundation. In 1993 and in order to change the strategy from the imitating cost-leader to the role of a differentiator, Lee Kun-hee, Lee Byung-chull’s successor, sold off ten of Samsung Group's subsidiaries, downsized the company, and merged other operations to concentrate on three industries: electronics, engineering, and chemicals (Samsung Electronics). 
Samsung is the world's largest manufacturer of Televisions and various other consumer electronics.
Samsung is the world's second largest mobile phone maker.
Compared to other major Korean companies, Samsung survived the Asian financial crisis of 1997-98 relatively unharmed. However, Samsung Motor Co, a $5 billion venture was sold to Renault at a significant loss. Most importantly, Samsung Electronics (SEC) was officially spun-off from the Samsung Group and has since come to dominate the group and the worldwide semiconductor business, even surpassing worldwide leader Intel in investments for the 2005 fiscal year. Samsung's brand strength has greatly improved in the last few years. Samsung became the largest producer of memory chips in the world in 1992, and is the world's second-largest chipmaker after Intel (see Worldwide Top 20 Semiconductor Market Share Ranking Year by Year). From 1999 to 2002, Samsung conspired with Hynix Semiconductor, Infineon Technologies, Elpida Memory (Hitachi and NEC) and Micron Technology to fix the prices of DRAM chips sold to American computer makers. In 2005 Samsung agreed to plead guilty and to pay a $300 million fine, the second-largest criminal antitrust fine in the US history. In 1995, it built its first liquid-crystal display screen. Ten years later, Samsung grew to be the world's largest manufacturer of liquid-crystal display panels. Sony, which had not invested in LCDs, contacted Samsung to cooperate. In 2006, S-LCD was established as a joint venture between Samsung and Sony in order to provide a stable supply of LCD panels for both manufacturers. S-LCD is owned by Samsung and Sony 51% to 49% respectively and operates its factories and facilities in Tangjung, South Korea. In 2008, Samsung became the largest mobile phone maker in the United States and 2nd largest mobile phone maker in the World. Considered a strong competitor by its rivals, Samsung Electronics expanded production dramatically to become the world's largest manufacturer of DRAM chips, flash memory, optical storage drives and it aims to double sales and become the top manufacturer of 20 products globally by 2010. It is now one of the world's leading manufacturers of liquid crystal displays and next generation mobile phones. Samsung Electronics, which saw record profits and revenue in 2004 and 2005, overtook Sony as one of the world's most popular consumer electronics brands, and is now ranked #20 in the world overall. By late 2005, Samsung had a net worth of US$77.6 billion. On April 21 2008, Lee Kun-hee resigned as the chairman of Samsung Electronics owing to the Samsung slush funds scandal. (Read more) |
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