Subsidiaries of foreign companies in Korea such as foreign luxury brand firms including Louis Vuitton, Gucci, Chanel, and multinationals such as Apple and Microsoft will have to receive external audits beginning next year.According to the Financial Supervisory Commission (FSC) on October 9, a revisi
It has been found that the Korea Fair Trade Commission (KFTC) has yet to reach a conclusion on the issue related to preloaded Google apps although it resumed its investigation into the issue in December last year. According to the KFTC, Google is considered to have forced the apps to be installed by
Google’s Android Pay debut in South Korea will be delayed to next year due to difficulties in negotiation with local credit card issuers. The simple payment system was expected to be launched in the domestic market by the end of this year.According to investment banking (IB) and information technolo
The heads of Google and Facebook have been chosen as a witness for the National Assembly's audit this year which will begin right after the Chuseok holidays, attracting public attention. They are expected to be questioned by lawmakers of the ruling and opposition parties over the issues like tax eva
Google is poised to enter the smartphone market in earnest. This means the emergence of another rival on the part of LG Electronics which is cooperating extensively with Google.Google recently bought the Pixel phone division of HTC for US$1.1 billion. Earlier, Google acquired Motorola for US$12.5 bi
The AI-based image search competition is getting hot. Google joins the fray between Naver and Kakao, heralding a tripartite race in AI image searches in the Korean market.According to the internet search industry on September 25, Naver, Kakao and Google are having fierce AI image search competition
Three South Korean brands– Samsung Electronics, Hyundai Motor and Kia Motors – have been placed in this year’s list of the top 100 global brands compiled by Interbrand, a global branding consulting group.According to the 2017 Top 100 Global Brands list announced by Interbrand on September 25 (local
According to German market research firm Statista, the size of the South Korean connected car market for this year is estimated at US$249.5 million whereas those of the United States, China, Germany and Japan for the same period are estimated at US$8.193 billion, US$3.038 billion, US$2.62 billion an
Amid continuous reports that a countdown began for Google's acquisition of HTC, on September 20 (local time), Rick Osterloh, senior vice president of the Hardware Business Division at Google, said on his blog that Google will pay US$1.1 billion for the acquisition of HTC.On the previous day, HTC ann
The latest smartphones including the Galaxy Note 8 were sold with exposure to "Bluetooth Bluebone" vulnerability.US-based IoT security firm Amis announced on September 19 that the company found Blueborne, the latest Bluetooth vulnerability, and informed Google and handset makers of it. Blueborne wor
According to industry sources on September 18, Samsung Electronics and LG Electronics have a different approach for smart home market expansion. However, the two companies have the same goal of using artificial intelligence (AI) and the Internet of Thins (IoT) technologies in all home appliances.Sam
Samsung Electronics and SK Hynix, which have a nearly 70 percent share of the global memory semiconductor market, are expected to see their quarterly Performance reach a record high once again. The business showings of the two companies have hit a new record high every quarter from the beginning of
At the end of August this year, Amazon and Microsoft entered into alliance to surprise the world information technology (IT) industry. They announced a plan to link Amazon's speech recognition-based AI assistant Alexa with Microsoft's Cortana. Amazon devoid of services such as e-mail and schedule ma
The Big 4 Chinese smartphone makers (Huawei, Oppo, Vivo and Xiaomi) will launch premium smartphone loaded with LG Display's small and medium sized organic light emitting diode (OLED) panels next year. This is the first time that the Big 4 was confirmed as customers of LG Display.According to the dis
As the Trump administration has discussed how to change “net neutrality” in earnest, interest in net neutrality policy changes is also rising in South Korea. However, the government announced to keep the current net neutrality policy for a while. Net neutrality is the principle that wire and wireles
As global ICT companies have pushing into the payment system market, domestic card companies are needed to prepare for it.According to an insight report titled “ICT Companies’ Entrance into Payment Market and Card Companies’ Counterplans,” Choi Min-ji, an analyst at the Credit Finance Association (C
Harman, an electronics and audio specialist acquired by Samsung Electronics earlier this year, unveiled two AI speakers at the IFA 2017 in Berlin, Germany.Harman Kardon’s Allure is loaded with Amazon's Alexa voice assistant service and JBL’s Link is with Google Assistant.While listening to music thr
Samsung Electronics has been approved to run an autonomous vehicle test in the United States, the Financial Times (FT) reported on September 1 (local time).A spokesperson for the California Department of Motor Vehicles (DMV) said it allowed the autonomous drive test by Samsung Electronics' semicondu
Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang sent an email to the Korea Advanced Institute of Science & Technology (KAIST). In the email, he said that he would sponsor the Artificial Intelligence (AI) World Cup of the KAIST and proposed the establishment of a joint AI robot research center.“We are discussing the establi
Toshiba's sell-off of its semiconductor business has been back to square one. The Japanese daily Nihon Keizai Shimbun reported on August 31 that Toshiba will resume negotiations with three groups -- the new US-Japan alliances, the Korea-US-Japan alliance and the Hon Hai alliance. The market's predic