China stalling on Samsung, LG

China, already flooded with foreign investments and keen on technology transfers, is stalling on requests by Samsung Electronics and LG Display to build LCD factories. 

The mood in both companies has been dampened by the delay, likely causing disruptions in their business plans.

Beijing’s approval was expected by April but has been delayed.

According to representatives of both firms, Beijing didn’t explain the delay. For LG, a trip by the company’s CEO together with reporters was scheduled for August but has been put on hold. 

Industry sources speculate that China is trying to protect its own manufacturers, while trying to favor Taiwanese firms after the two were brought closer through an Economic Cooperation Framework Agreement (ECFA).

Taiwanese manufacturers compete with the two Korean firms in LCDs that are used in virtually all mobile gadgets. 

LG jacks up smartphone sales target to 6 mil.

LG Electronics is aiming to sell 6 million smartphones this year, a senior executive exclusively said Tuesday, asking not to be indentified.

The detailed sales target came at a time when LG was in "critical phase" to boost its smartphone presence. 

Even if it meets this target, it would account for only 30 percent of Samsung Electronics' sales. 

Some industry experts believe that the LG goal is ambitious, considering its late start. LG has all but been excluded from the Apple-Samsung smartphone competition, which dragged down its outlook. 

LG has decided to reduce its bloated mobile phone lineup by half to around 70 from last year's 145. 

It plans to release 20 sets of smartphones this year with 15 models being Android phones.

He said that 4.2 million phones will be Android-based, while 1.8 million will use Microsoft's Windows Mobile operating system, the executive said. 

"We can't exactly predict the market. But one thing clear is LG is heavily betting on Google’s Android operating system. The number of Android phones will be more than earlier expected," an LG spokesman said.

'SKT-KT competition to hurt mobile industry'

Moody's Investors Service expects a more industry-wide negative impact from the fierce competition between SK Telecom and KT. 

"Competition among Korean telecom companies is not likely to abate any time soon, and this trend has obvious credit negative ramifications as the carriers speed up capex spending to meet the huge demand for high-speed data services," said Laura Acres, a Moody's vice president, in a recent report.

The senior credit officer added an ever-rising spiral of capital expenditure and marketing costs to retain customers have obvious negative implications for profitability and cash-flow.

Cindy Kang, a spokesman for SK Telecom, declined to comment about the report, Wednesday. Rhee In-won, a senior spokesman at KT, said the report was ``nothing special.’’

In detail, KT has announced that it will invest 5.1 trillion won or $4.3 billion on fixed-line and wireless networks until the end of 2014 to enjoy what the company claims is the "first-mover" advantage in the rapidly-growing local wireless sector.

SK Telecom, which lags in terms of the number of Wi-Fi zones compared to its biggest domestic rival, is also planning to step up the efforts for an early adaptation of the next-generation telecom technology called long-term evolution or LTE.

Although the telecom regulator designated a marketing cap ― no more than 22 percent of the total revenue ― to soothe fiercer competition, the top three local carriers including LG Uplus have failed to meet the guideline.

Korea joins privacy backlash over Google

The South Korean government appears to have its own BlackBerry headache with Google as it continues to show uneasiness about the data on its citizens kept in foreign servers.

But privacy watchdogs here are unsure who to distrust more; a global corporation that intercepts e-mail messages, passwords and other sensitive information from unsuspecting Internet users or an increasingly-intrusive government that demands the data be handed over.

Korean police raided Google’s Seoul office on Tuesday, representing the latest extension of legal challenges the Internet giant is facing around the world over its controversial ``Street View’’ mapping service. 

Investigators acting under warrant seized computer hard drives and company documents from the property during a search that continued for six hours as they 
look into the allegations that Google illegally collected and stored personal data sent over unsecured Wi-Fi wireless networks. They unlawfully gathered communications records may include e-mail and instant messages, passwords and search histories, according to police. 

It’s unlikely that the police will find anything meaningful from the haul as Google Korea says that the data collected from the Street View cars, which first appeared on the streets of Seoul in October last year, is stored in Google’s U.S. servers. 
After analyzing the data from the hard drives, a process that may take more than a month, police officials are planning to bring in a number of Google Korea officials for questioning.

'South Korea to take center stage in global culture via G20'

By Lee Hyo-won

When Angelina Jolie visited Seoul recently, the Hollywood beauty said it was unfortunate that news of inter-Korean tensions eclipsed the international media coverage on South Korea.

Case in point: Sohn Jie-ae would have been busy reporting Pyongyang’s human rights violations or artillery activities as the CNN correspondent to Seoul. But since February, she has been able to focus on the southern half of the Korean Peninsula as the spokesperson for the upcoming G20 Summit here.

“While working as a CNN correspondent for 15 years I covered the Korean Peninsula from top to bottom. I mostly dealt with North Korea but at some point I wanted to do a little more of South Korea. There are a lot of things about South Korea that is important, but North Korea dominates the global arena so much,” Sohn told The Korea Times last week in her office in Samcheong-dong, downtown Seoul.

Korea-UAE nuclear tie-up strengthened

UAE students take a class on nuclear power generation at Sudo Electric Technical High School in southern Seoul late last month. / Courtesy of KEPCO

After securing a mega-sized nuclear contract with the United Arab Emirates (UAE), Korea is pushing to form a closer partnership with the Middle Eastern country including providing education to foster a highly skilled workforce.

A total of 48 UAE students from the Institute of Applied Technology (IAT) as well as Khalifa University of Science, Technology and Research have recently finished a month-long training session on nuclear facilities.

Korea Electric Power Corp. (KEPCO) 

KEPCO CEO Kim Ssang-soo

expects that such programs will accelerate the collaboration between the two countries in nuclear power generation in connection to the $20 billion contract.

During the waning days of 2009, KEPCO clinched the mammoth deal with the UAE under which the state-run agency will build four nuclear reactors by 2020 along with other Korean construction corporations. 

``Many of the students will become the main operators of the UAE nuclear reactors in the future. We plan to hold a training session like this every year,’’ KEPCO spokesperson Kim Hye-lim said. 

``Most of them were happy with the education about our nuclear power station or the on-site training, which will take charge of the UAE facilities.’’

LG, Samsung, Daewoo worry about fallout from Iran sanctions

Korean electronics firms are considering potential countermeasures that could be taken by Iran in the event Korea joins the United States to impose sanctions in retribution for its nuclear development.

Samsung and LG are saying that no adverse steps have so far been taken but are waiting to see how the situation can change in the coming weeks.

Creditors of Daewoo Electronics are facing prospects of a deal for a stake sale, being negotiated with an Iranian firm, not progressing. 

On Thursday, Samsung Electronics said it has been reviewing all options to counter possible freezing of diplomatic ties between South Korea and Iran.

"Samsung currently doesn't see any negative effects in Iran due to political reasons. But we are not ruling out worst case scenarios," said Leonor Lee, a senior spokeswoman at Samsung.

Lee said the world's top TV maker is still safe with cash transactions and other pending issues, though she declined to unveil the sales portion in Iran out of Samsung's total revenue. 

Korea should bring 'can-do' apporach to G20

Dominic Barton McKinsey & Company Chairman

Following the Toronto Summit in June, there have been growing doubts about the legitimacy of the G20 Summit, as most of the previous gatherings were only slogan-oriented with no workable agreements and solutions.

Leaders around the world are now paying attention to the G20 Seoul Summit slated for Nov. 11 and 12. They believe the G20 is now at a crucial juncture on whether it should remain as the world’s policy forum and that the outcome of the Seoul Summit can determine its future.

A noted global consultant said that in order to make the summit a success and keep the G20 afloat, Korea should take a different approach from its predecessors in its role, noting that it is the first G20 meeting to take place in a non-G8 state in Asia.

“Korea’s role at the summit should be action-oriented. It should bring a ‘can-do’ approach to the meeting, ensuring that the G20 makes concrete progress on its ambitious agenda,” McKinsey & Company Chairman Dominic Barton said in an interview with The Korea Times.

Top designer Andre Kim dies at 74

Korea’s iconic fashion designer Andre Kim, known for his bold and elegant evening and wedding gown collections, died Thursday evening at a hospital in Seoul. He was 74. 

Kim, who had been battling colon cancer, was hospitalized at Seoul National University Hospital last month after he developed pneumonia. He failed to recover and died at 7:20 p.m. Thursday, 20 days after hospitalization. 

Although his health worsened from earlier this year, he took part in various events and activities. 

In March, he unveiled his 2011 spring-summer collection at this year’s CHIC, Asian’s largest annual fashion exhibition held in Beijing, but rarely made public appearances since then. 

Despite his weak health, he was known to have been preparing for a fashion show in China in October. 

Kim always featured the nation’s top stars in his shows and received respect from the public for his frequent donations of profits to the underprivileged.