The Samsung Group is expected to freeze or cut wages for 10 percent of its employees after the company decided to freeze wages for about 2,000 executives due to a huge drop in earnings.On Dec. 21, the Samsung Group finished employee performance evaluations based on a rating scale of 1 to 5 (with 5 b
The prosecution has reportedly imposed bans on international travel for Cho Seong-jin, CEO of the Home Appliance Unit of LG Electronics, and will request an arrest warrant soon.He is being accused of vandalizing the washing machines of Samsung Electronics just prior to the IFA 2014, the largest cons
The Wall Street Journal reported on Dec. 19 (local time) that the U.S. government is looking to designate North Korea as a state sponsor of terrorism because of the recent hacking of Sony Pictures. The FBI is officially holding the North accountable for the incident, and President Barack Obama also
The machinery industry (excluding shipbuilding) is expected to enjoy the slow recovery of production and export in 2015, thanks to the continuing improvement in economic performance of leading economic powers such as the United States and Europe. Nevertheless, there remain several risk factors such
Recalls for imported cars have increased over twofold compared to last year. While their high fuel economy and price competence gained by the Free Trade Agreements (FTAs) are setting a new sales record every year, the recall figures are leading to indications that they are rather negligent in terms
KT announced on Dec. 16 that it has successfully developed and demonstrated technology to maintain the Carrier Aggregation (CA) of HetNet, which is acknowledged to be core network infrastructure for 5G technology, in partnership with Ericsson. This method would guarantee more stable connection speed
The domestic automobile industry is expressing concerns over Hankook Tire’s decision to take over Halla Visteon Climate Control Corp. (HVCC).According to sources in the industry on Dec. 18, Hankook Tire, the nation’s largest tire manufacturer, has entered into a stock purchase agreement to buy stake
Both the nuclear power generation capacity and the number of nuclear power plants in operation have gone up sharply since the Fukushima disaster three years ago.This trend has been witnessed in a number of countries other than European ones that have to increase the ratio of alternative energy use t
China, the world’s number one greenhouse gas emitter, emitted 9.084 billion tons of greenhouse gases in 2012, which was equivalent to one-third of the global total. It was followed by the United States, which has emitted more than six billion tons this year.Still, American and Chinese corporations a
There is growing controversy among netizens over the fact that the design of the Galaxy A3 and Galaxy A5 is quite similar to that of the iPhone 5.Samsung Electronics recently released the two models in Taiwan. The Galaxy A5 features a 5" HD Super AMOLED display, a Snapdragon 410 procesor, 2GB of RAM
Sony Pictures has decided to not premiere “The Interview” this Chrismas season, after several movie theaters have said they would not show the movie due to terrorist concerns. The hacker group responsible for the recent cyber attack on Sony Pictures Entertainment sent threatening emails to theaters
There has been a series of accidents at the 2nd Lotte World Mall in Seoul, including the death of a worker at the construction site and accidents in the facility’s cinema and aquarium. With more and more people feeling uneasy about safety concerns, Lotte Group released a statement of apology to the
Hyundai Rotem, the manufacturer of the high-speed KTX-Sancheon train, will have to pay large compensation to Korail, the national railroad operator, for financial damage caused by defects in the trains.Earlier, Korail filed a compensation suit against Hyundai Rotem. On Dec. 16, the Seoul Central Dis
Able C&C, which runs brand shops Missha and Apieu, recently opened the fourth overseas Missha in Naucalpan, Mexico and the fifth one in Claveria, Mexico City.Mostly middle or higher class people live in both regions. In particular, these regions are popular with young couples with purchasing power,
The annual growth of North Korea’s per-capita gross national income (GNI) hit a seven-year low last year, and the income divide between the two Koreas reached a record high.According to the Statistics Korea, the per-capita GNI of North Korea totaled 1.38 million won (US$1,260) in 2013, whereas that
The Internet industry is expected to see fierce competition next year in the market of Online to Offline (O2O) that connects things on the Internet to things in the real world.According to the Internet service providers including Naver and Daum Kakao on Dec. 16, these companies are planning or prepa
Samsung Electronics' share of the global smartphone market fell below 30 percent in the third quarter of this year. In contrast, Apple, Huawei, and Xiaomi Technology narrowed the gap with their Korean rival.According to data on global smartphone sales in Q3 published by market research firm Gartner
Mobile quick payment service KakaoPay is expected to expand its service from online to offline as early as the beginning of next year. This marks the emergence of a new service similar to Apple Pay, an offline payment service on the iPhone 6. Many expect that the competition in the quick payment mar
An increasing number of global IT companies are entering the mobile payment market. Industry analysts are saying that the phenomenon is due to their anticipation that the mobile payment sector will become the foundation of all industries in the future, rather than their desire to get profits from mo
Huawei, the world’s third-largest smartphone vendor and top-ranked communications equipment supplier, showed its willingness to aggressively target the Korean mobile phone market once again.“Our company will continue to unveil products that Korean consumers want in partnership with LG U+, SK Telecom