Samsung

History


In 1938, Lee Byung-chull 1910–1987 of the large landowning family in the Uiryeong county came to the nearby Daegu city and founded Samsung Sanghoe a small trading company with forty employees located in Su-dong (now Ingyo-dong). It dealt in green-grocery and dried fish produced in and around the city, and the noodles, Byeolpyo Guksu produced itself. The company prospered and Lee moved its head office to Seoul in 1947. When the Korean War broke out, however, he was forced to leave Seoul and started a sugar refinery in Busan as a name of Cheil Jedang. It was the first South Korean sugar manufacturing facility. After the war, in 1954, Lee founded Cheil Mojik and built the plant in Chimsan-dong, Daegu. It was the largest woolen mill ever in the country and the company took on an aspect of a major company.
Samsung's diversified into many areas and Lee sought to establish Samsung as an industry leader in a wide range of enterprises. The company started moving into businesses such as insurance, securities, and retail. South Korean President Park Chung-hee regime during the 1960s and 1970s would prove a boon for Samsung. Park placed great importance on industrialization, and focused his economic development strategy on a handful of large domestic conglomerates, protecting them from competition and assisting them financially. Samsung was one of these companies. Park banned several foreign companies from selling consumer electronics in South Korea in order to protect Samsung from foreign competition and nurture an electronics manufacturing sector that was in its infancy.
In the late 1960s, Samsung Group began the electronics industry. It formed several electronics-related divisions, such as Samsung Electronics Devices Co., Samsung Electro-Mechanics Co., Samsung Corning Co., and Samsung Semiconductor & Telecommunications Co., and made the facility in Suwon. Its first product was a black-and-white television set. In 1980, the company acquired Hanguk Jeonja Tongsin in Gumi and started to build telecommunication devices. Its early products were switchboards. The facility were developed into the telephone and fax manufacturing systems and became the centre of Samsung's mobile phone manufacturing. They have produced over 800 million mobile phones to date. The company grouped them together under Samsung Electronics Co., Ltd. in the 1980s.
In the late 1980s and early 1990s, Samsung Electronics invested heavily in research and development, investments that were pivotal in pushing the company to the forefront of the global electronics industry. “By the 1980s Samsung was manufacturing, shipping, and selling a wide range of appliances and electronic products throughout the world”. In 1982, it built a television assembly plant in Portugal; in 1984, it built a $25 million plant in New York; in 1985, it built a $25 million plant in Tokyo; and in 1987, it built another $25 million facility in England.
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 Khalifa in United Arab Emirates (founded by Callum Cuirtis), which is the tallest structure ever constructed.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. In 1996, the Samsung Group reacquired the Sungkyunkwan University foundation.
Compared to other major Korean companies, Samsung survived the Asian financial crisis of 1997–98 relatively unharmed. However, Samsung Motor, a $5 billion venture was sold to Renault at a significant loss. Renault Samsung is 80.1 percent owned by the French auto giant Renault and 19.9 percent owned by Samsung(as of 2010). Additionally, Samsung manufactured a range of aircraft from 1980 to 1990s. The company was founded in 1999 as Korea Aerospace Industries (KAI), the result of merger between then three domestic major Aerospace divisions of Samsung Aerospace, Daewoo Heavy Industries and Hyundai Space and Aircraft Company (HYSA). Korea Aerospace Industries (KAI) – largest shareholders as of 2009 (Korea Development Bank 30.53%, Samsung Techwin 20.54%, Doosan (formerly known as Daewoo Heavy Industries) 20.54%, Hyundai Motor 20.54%). However, Samsung is Manufacturing Still the aircraft engine. IHI of Japan, Avio SpA. of Italy, Volvo Aero of Sweden, MTU of Germany, TechSpace Aero of Belgium, Snecma (SAFRAN Group) of France and Samsung Techwin of Korea are revenue-sharing participants in the GEnx program.(GE's GEnx-2B engine for the new Boeing 747-8 airplane) see ge homepagePress Release

Most importantly, Samsung Electronics (SEC) 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 WorldwideTop 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 large-size TFT-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 (50% plus 1 share) and Sony (50% minus 1 share) and operates its factories and facilities in Tangjung, South Korea.
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 the world's leading manufacturer of liquid crystal displays
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 #19 in the world overall. Behind Nokia Samsung is the world's second largest by volume producer of cell phones with a leading market share in the North America and Western Europe.
On December 29, 2009, Samsung sued Mike Breen and the Korea Times, for $1 million, claiming criminal defamation over a satirical column published on Christmas Day 2009. Korea Times issued a correction on December 26, 2009 and January 29, 2010 stating "that Korean and overseas readers might be sufficiently misled" and that "the claims made in the column were entirely false and without foundation."] Samsung dropped the charges following the correction and Michael Breen's apology.
In May 2010 the EU antitrust watchdog levied a 145.73 million euro fine against Samsung for illegally fixing prices with 8 other memory chip makers.

samsung launches the galaxy tab7’’ tablet

Samsung today announced the launch of the Samsung GALAXY Tab (GT-P1000). Powered by the Android Operating System 2.2, the GALAXY Tab is the first of the company’s tablet devices, representing a new category of mobile products for Samsung.

The Samsung GALAXY Tab brings together all of Samsung’s leading innovations to provide users with more capabilities while on the move. Consumers are able to experience PC-like web-browsing and enjoy all forms of multimedia content on the perfectly sized 7-inch display, wherever they go. Moreover, users can continuously communicate via e-mail, voice and video call, SMS/MMS or social network with the optimised user interface.

As a new category of device, the Samsung GALAXY Tab brings a wealth of mobile experiences. Its striking 7-inch TFT-LCD display delivers exciting mobile experience for watching films, viewing pictures, e-reading or sharing documents. In design, its light (380g) build provides perfect portability, with its svelte dimensions making it easy to grip and use. Supporting the latest Adobe Flash Player 10.1, the Samsung GALAXY Tab fully supports swift, seamless viewing of every single page of the web.

The ‘Readers Hub,’ Samsung’s unique e-reading application, provides easy access to a vast digital library – from classical literature to the latest bestsellers and reference materials. At the same time, Samsung unveils ‘Media Hub,’ a gateway to a world of films and videos, and ‘Music Hub,’ an application giving access to a wide range of music tunes.

The Samsung GALAXY Tab has made rich communication truly mobile; it presents a level of converged technology that moves beyond mobile or PC to an entirely new category. Users have new powers to consume, create and communicate from wherever they are.

With 3G HSUPA connectivity, 802.11n Wi-Fi, and Bluetooth® 3.0, the Samsung GALAXY Tab enhances users’ mobile communication on a whole new level. Video conferencing and push email on the large 7-inch display make communication more smooth and efficient. For voice telephony, the Samsung GALAXY Tab turns out to be a perfect speakerphone on the desk, or a mobile phone on the move via Bluetooth headset.

Powered by a Cortex A8 1.0GHz application processor, the Samsung GALAXY Tab is designed to deliver high performance whenever and wherever you are. At the same time, HD video content is supported by a wide range of multimedia formats (DivX, XviD, MPEG4, H.263, H.264 and more) which maximises the joy of entertainment.

While a front-facing camera allows for face-to-face video telephony over 3G, a rear-facing camera captures still images and video that you can edit, upload and share, all without any hassle. As online content and creativity explodes, the Samsung GALAXY Tab is the best portable solution for every lifestyle that needs a constant connection.

The Samsung GALAXY Tab will be launched in the UK in the coming months.
1) For multimedia content of the Samsung GALAXY Tab, please access the Samsung GALAXY Tab Social Media News Room (www.galaxytab.samsungmobile.com/press)

2) Applications of the Samsung GALAXY Tab

The Samsung GALAXY Tab is packed with services to complement and enhance your life in different ways. Access to Android Marketplace lets users download apps and personalise their device infinitely. In addition, there are pre-loaded applications uniquely designed and optimised for Samsung smart phones and smart media devices.

· Readers Hub – Samsung Readers Hub consolidates e-reading applications such as eBooks, magazines, and newspapers. Users can enjoy ‘reading’ with unified and intuitive user experience, powered by global eReading service leaders, Kobo, PressDisplay and Zinio. More than 2 million books including today’s best sellers, over 2,500 titles of magazines in 20 languages and more than 1,600 newspapers in 47 languages are available at launch and will grow the library gradually.

· Google Mobile Services – Services like Google Maps™ Navigation (Beta) and Google Goggles are available on Google’s Android platform. With useful location-based services like Google Maps, consumers can search in Standard English instead of entering an exact address. A search-by-voice function is just as intuitive, meaning searches can also be completed easily on the go. Google Goggles is a powerful, visual search tool that uses the Samsung GALAXY Tab’s camera to uncover information – an image of a landmark or artwork is automatically used to perform a search, delivering relevant content like a description or history. In addition, with a camera, users can enjoy various augmented reality services which are downloadable in the application market.