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The Samsung Group is a multinational conglomerate corporation headquartered in Samsung Town, Seoul, South Korea. The Samsung Group comprises numerous international affiliated businesses, most of them united under the Samsung brand including Samsung Electronics, the world's largest technology company by sales; Samsung Heavy Industries, the world's second largest shipbuilder; Samsung Engineering was ranked 35th, Samsung C&T 72nd in a 2009 ranking of 225 global construction firms compiled by the Engineering News-Record, a U.S. construction journal. Samsung Life Insurance was ranked 14th in a 2009 ranking of Fortune Global 500 Industries. Samsung Everland, South Korea's first theme park opened in 1976 as Yongin Farmland. It is now the fifth most popular theme park in the world, beating out Epcot, Disney MGM and Disney's Animal Kingdom. Cheil Worldwide operates as a subsidiary of Samsung Group and was ranked #19 among the "World's Top 50 Agency Companies" by revenue in 2010. Shilla Hotel, a subsidiary of the Samsung Group, has been ranked #58 among the "2009 World's Best Top 100 Hotels" in the annual reader survey conducted by the prestigious international business magazine, Institutional Investor.
The Best Overall Generalist Sales Force survey ranks 22 firms that participated in Institutional Investor’s 2007 All-Asia Research Team survey. Samsung Securities (Investment Bank) was ranked #14 among the "2007 All-Asia Best Overall Generalist Sales Force Rankings" by revenue in 2007.
Gartner’s “Market Share Analysis: Top 10 Consulting Providers’ Revenue, Growth and Market Share, Worldwide and Regional 2009” is intended as a tool for service providers. Samsung SDS was second in Asia Pacific with IBM topping the list, and Accenture third.
Samsung Group accounts for about a fifth of South Korea's total exports. 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 35th largest economy in the world if ranked, larger than that of Argentina. 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 Samsung's international success as a role model. Samsung bought Media Group in 2010.
In 1938, Lee Byung-chull (1910–1987) of a large landowning family in the Uiryeong county came to the nearby Daegu city and founded Samsung Sanghoe (삼성상회), a small trading company with forty employees located in Su-dong (now Ingyo-dong). It dealt in groceries produced in and around the city and produced noodles 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. 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.
In the late 1960s, Samsung Group entered into 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. In 1982, it built a television assembly plant in Portugal; in 1984, a plant in New York; in 1985, a plant in Tokyo; in 1987, a facility in England; and another facility in Austin in 1996. In total, Samsung has invested about $5.6 billion in the Austin location – by far the largest foreign investment in Texas and one of the largest single foreign investments in the United States. The new investment will bring the total Samsung investment in Austin to more than $9 billion.
Samsung started to rise as an international corporation in the 1990s. 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. In 1993, Lee Kun-hee 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.
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). 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, and, 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.
Samsung Electronics overtook Sony as one of the world's most popular consumer electronics brands in 2004 and 2005, 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. SCTV and Indosiar are subsidiary of Surya Citra Media that owned by Samsung. In 2011, SCTV and Indosiar will merger and given stake by Samsung.
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 US history.
In May 2010 the EU antitrust watchdog levied a €145.73 million fine against Samsung for the same DRAM cartel.
In December 2010 the European Commission fined six LCD panel producers including Samsung a total of €648.925 million for operating a cartel. Samsung received a full reduction of the potential fine for being the first firm to cooperate with the EU anti-trust authorities.
In April 2011 Apple Inc. announced that they were suing Samsung over the design of their Galaxy range of mobile phones. The lawsuit was filed on 15 April 2011 and alleges that Samsung violated Apple's trademarks and patents and "slavishly" copied the iPhone and iPad. Of the lawsuit, Apple said "This kind of blatant copying is wrong." Samsung issued a statement saying "Samsung's development of core technologies and strengthening our intellectual property portfolio are keys to our continued success" before announcing that they would contest the allegations. A few days later, Samsung issued a counterclaim against Apple claiming patent infringement.
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