Don't Change Generals During War'... Year-End [Personnel] Decisions in Business World Opt for Survival < Video < Article

※ This content was broadcast on the 'Economy ON' program of Yonhap News TV on December 3 (Tuesday) at 4 PM. (Featuring: Kim Kyung-lim, Yonhap Infomax reporter, Hosted by: Lee Min-jae)

[Anchor Lee Min-jae] The year-end personnel decisions for major domestic groups have almost been completed.

[Anchor] The keyword for year-end personnel decisions is 'survival'... Samsung and LG opt for stability.

Samsung and LG Groups have chosen stability. Shall we look at Samsung first?

First, looking at the executive appointments, most of the 'OB' or senior executives, who received the most attention, have been retained.

It's particularly noteworthy that most of the key personnel who were previously in the Future Strategy Office have also remained.

The Business Support Task Force (T/F), which reviews Samsung Electronics' major strategies, has become even stronger with the so-called 'long-standing vassals'. Vice Chairman Chung Hyun-ho of the Business Support TF has been retained. Samsung Electronics' Chief Financial Officer (CFO), President Park Hak-kyu of the Management Support Office, will also join the TF.

In addition, President Kim Yong-kwan, who came from the Future Strategy Office, has been promoted and moved to the position of President in charge of DS Division Management Strategy in this personnel decision.

If the Business Support TF is considered the control tower that reviews Samsung's major strategies, the DS Management Strategy position can be seen as a bridge role between the Business Support TF and the semiconductor division. It's said that President Kim moved to the DS Management Strategy position based on his experience of handling semiconductor investments in Samsung's former Future Strategy Office.

These are essentially the closest aides to Chairman Lee Jae-yong, who went through the state affairs intervention incident together.

[Anchor] Besides the retention of Future Strategy Office alumni, were there any other characteristic appointments?

It was an appointment that also brings to mind the saying 'Check even extinguished fires again'.

This refers to Advisor Lee Won-jin, who was appointed as the new President of Global Marketing. In fact, President Lee Won-jin had attracted attention when he stepped down to an advisory role in last year's executive appointments. An advisor position is a kind of consultancy role given to retiring executives. By returning as the head of Global Marketing after just one year, he's being evaluated as making a triumphant return.

[Anchor] Is he really that remarkable?

President Lee Won-jin originally came from Google. He was recruited by Samsung Electronics in 2014.

Before joining Samsung Electronics in 2014, President Lee served as Vice President of North American Advertising Solutions (Google Korea Representative) at Google. Prior to that, he also served as the representative of Adobe Korea, a global IT software company.

After being recruited by Samsung Electronics, he worked as the President of the Service Business Team in the MX Division before stepping down. Recognizing this experience again, from next year, he will oversee Samsung Electronics' global marketing, brand, and online business.

[Anchor] I heard that Samsung Group also produced its first female CEO.

The emergence of the first female Chief Executive Officer (CEO) is quite exceptional. This is President Kim Kyung-a of Samsung Bioepis.

In fact, there were already three female presidents in the Samsung Group. However, two of them are President Lee Boo-jin of Hotel Shilla and President Lee Seo-hyun of Samsung C&T. The other one is President Lee Young-hee of Samsung Electronics Marketing. Among the owner family, only President Lee Boo-jin serves as a CEO.

In that sense, it's quite notable that a female representative director has been appointed at Samsung Bioepis. In fact, foreign media have recently shown considerable interest in the emergence of Samsung Group's first female CEO.

President Kim Kyung-a is a biosimilar development expert who completed her bachelor's and master's degrees in pharmacy at Seoul National University and obtained a Ph.D. in toxicology from Johns Hopkins University in the United States.

She joined Samsung in 2010 as a senior researcher in bio-new drug development at Samsung Electronics SAIT (formerly Samsung Advanced Institute of Technology). She then moved to Samsung Bioepis in 2015. She can be seen as an elite who has been promoted to president and representative director about 15 years after moving to Samsung. In this respect, I think the weight that newly appointed President Kim Kyung-a carries is quite heavy.

[Anchor] How about LG Group?

LG Group also retained most of its vice chairmen in this year's year-end personnel decisions. It can be seen as maintaining experienced top management. The two-vice chairman system was maintained with Vice Chairman Kwon Bong-seok of LG Corp. and Vice Chairman Shin Hak-cheol of LG Chem, and President Cho Joo-wan of LG Electronics also kept his position. The only place where the head changed was LG Uplus, where President Hong Beom-sik, head of LG Corp.'s Management Strategy Division, was appointed as the new head.

[Anchor] What are the peculiarities of LG Group's personnel decisions?

About 23% (28 people) of the total new executives, which is about 86, came from the fields of artificial intelligence, bio, and clean tech. As a result, the number of executives from R&D has reached 218, the highest ever.

[Anchor] Hyundai Motor Group, which made personnel decisions somewhat early, also had quite radical appointments.

Hyundai Motor made a bold move by appointing a foreigner as a representative director.

This is President Jose Muñoz. President Jose Muñoz, who will take office in January next year, is currently serving as the Global Chief Operating Officer (COO) of Hyundai Motor.

Hyundai Motor says that President Muñoz played a significant role in the company's growth to become the world's third-largest automaker, thanks to its performance in the North American region.

However, a more convincing explanation is the strategy to respond to Trump's potential second term. It's interpreted as a plan to facilitate communication with the local government by placing an American as president.

For the same reason, another American was newly recruited as president. This is President Sung Kim, who naturalized to the United States and then worked as a diplomat for the U.S. government. President Sung Kim served as the U.S. Ambassador to South Korea, joined Hyundai Motor Group as an advisor last year, and was appointed as the President of External Cooperation in this year's personnel decisions.

[Anchor] I understand that President Jose Muñoz also revealed his future plans as CEO at an official event this time. Can you briefly summarize it?

President Jose Muñoz recently received a lot of spotlight at the LA Auto Show. Foreign media, in particular, showed great interest in the fact that President Muñoz is a Hispanic American and asked about his plans as CEO.

The part of President Muñoz's remarks that deserves the most attention is Hyundai Motor's response to U.S. trade policies and the repeal of the Inflation Reduction Act (IRA).

At the local event, President Muñoz hinted to reporters that Hyundai Motor has been closely preparing for the U.S. election scenarios, saying that they would respond appropriately to "any regulation".

This attitude is also evident in Hyundai Motor Group's recent U.S. lobbying status. According to my check on OpenSecrets, a U.S. lobbying fund statistics site, Hyundai Motor Group officially spent $1.79 million up to the third quarter of this year. This is the highest level based on the third quarter historically.

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Back to President Muñoz's story.

The point President Muñoz emphasized is that 'Hyundai Motor decided on various investments' before the U.S. election results came out. As he said, it seems to show the will to shift the axis of sales to North America, the largest electric vehicle market, regardless of 'any regulations'.

[Anchor] Lastly, we can't help but ask about the trends of third and fourth-generation owners in the year-end personnel decisions.

There were many appearances of third and fourth-generation owners in their 30s and 40s in this personnel decision as well.

First, let's look at Lotte Group.

In Lotte Group, Shin Yu-yeol, head of Lotte Holdings' Future Growth Office and the eldest son of Chairman Shin Dong-bin, was promoted to vice president. He is the grandson of Shin Kyuk-ho, the founder of Lotte. The new Vice President Shin will be at the forefront of new businesses and global businesses from this year.

In the case of GS Group, Huh Seo-hong, Vice President of GS Retail's Management Strategy Service Unit, was appointed as the representative director and president. He is the fourth generation of GS Group founder Huh Man-jung and the fifth cousin of GS Group Chairman Huh Tae-soo.

With this promotion, the business community expects that GS Retail will enter full-fledged fourth-generation management, and the pace of generational change within the group will also accelerate.

HD Hyundai Group Vice Chairman Chung Ki-sun was also recently promoted to Senior Vice Chairman. It's been a year since his promotion to vice chairman last year, and it can be seen that the group's succession work is in its final stages.

Generational change also took place in the LG family.

Koo Hyung-mo, CEO of LX MDI and the eldest son of Chairman Koo Bon-joon, was recently promoted from vice president to president in the personnel decisions. LX MDI is the group's management consulting firm, and President Koo's promotion is being interpreted as a signal that he is officially entering group management.

Also, in LS Group, Koo Dong-hwi, Vice President of LS MnM and the eldest son of Koo Ja-yeol, Chairman of the Board of Directors of LS Corp., was promoted to CEO. Vice President Koo is said to be proving his management skills by pursuing an initial public offering (IPO) at LS MnM.

(Yonhap Infomax Industry Department Reporter Kim Kyung-lim)

※This content is from the video news covered in the Yonhap News TV's Investigation File corner.

klkim@yna.co.kr

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Kyung Lim Kim klkim@yna.co.kr