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Samsung’s Chairman Has Cardiac Procedure After Heart Attack Samsung’s Chairman Has Cardiac Procedure After Heart Attack
(about 4 hours later)
SEOUL — The chairman of Samsung Electronics Company, the flagship of South Korea’s biggest conglomerate, had a cardiac procedure on Sunday after suffering a heart attack, the Samsung Medical Center said in a statement. The chairman of Samsung Electronics, Lee Kun-hee, who helped transform the business into a technology giant, was in stable condition on Sunday after having a heart attack, the company said.
The chairman, Lee Kun-hee, 72, is now in recovery. Mr. Lee had trouble breathing on Saturday night and was admitted late on Saturday night to a hospital, where he received cardiopulmonary resuscitation for symptoms of cardiac arrest, the statement said. Mr. Lee, 72, was recovering at Samsung Medical Center in Seoul, said the company, which declined to comment further about his condition. According to Reuters, he was admitted to a hospital Saturday night before being transferred to the Samsung Medical Center.
He was then transferred to Samsung Medical Center, where he had a cardiac procedure for acute myocardial infarction, and is now in stable condition, the center added. While he has not directly overseen many of Samsung’s products, including its popular smartphones, Mr. Lee is credited with shaping Samsung into one of the most profitable consumer electronics companies in the world. The company is now a leader in smartphones and flat-screen televisions, as well as semiconductors and washing machines.
Mr. Lee has had problems with his respiratory system since surgery for lung cancer in 1999. He was hospitalized with symptoms of light pneumonia in August. Mr. Lee has previously been treated for lung cancer and pneumonia, and his latest health problem will almost renew calls for a concrete succession plan. His son, Lee Jae-yong, who served as the company’s chief operating officer until 2012 and is now the Samsung’s vice chairman, is widely expected to eventually take over from his father.
Samsung Group, which has assets of about 435 trillion won, spanning handset-making to ship building to medical services, has been restructuring ahead of a widely expected transfer of ownership to the third generation of the founding family. Though the elder Mr. Lee’s contributions to Samsung have been vital, the implications of his declining health to Samsung do not seem to carry as much weight as it has for other companies, like at Apple with its former chief executive, Steven P. Jobs.
On Thursday, its IT solutions affiliate, Samsung SDS, announced plans to list shares on the local stock market this year, a signal of additional restructuring of family ownership in the conglomerate. Mr. Jobs had a hands-on role in the companies’ creations and inventions, and his death raised concerns among investors that the company could not continue to release successful, innovative products.
In recent years, Mr. Lee has also promoted his children to top positions and has shuffled affiliates. By contrast, Samsung, a South Korean company, does not lean so much on just one person’s vision. Instead, the company is a huge and complex organization with many executives overseeing each different part of the company. That includes J.K. Shin, a chief executive who oversees the mobile device division, and Kim Hyun-suk, another executive, who heads of the company’s television business.
Mr. Lee’s son Jay Y. Lee, who is vice chairman of Samsung Electronics, is expected to eventually succeed his father as chairman of the flagship unit. Chetan Sharma, an independent telecom analyst who does consulting for phone companies, said Mr. Lee did not personify Samsung’s global brand like Mr. Jobs did for Apple.
“Steve was the driving force behind all the products down to the last detail,” he said. “There are many senior executives who can step in and the world won’t notice.”
Mr. Sharma added: “While Mr. Lee built an empire in Samsung, he isn’t identified with the brand or the products as Mr. Jobs was with Apple.”
Still, Samsung’s strong position in the smartphone market, which has helped cement its reputation as a global powerhouse, is now being challenged by new low-cost rivals from China and on the high end by Apple.
Samsung remains one of the few handset makers to profit from selling smartphones, with it phones like the Galaxy S5 winning over critics and consumers. Yet last month, the company reported the lowest quarterly sales in over a year at its handset unit, which generated more than three-quarters of Samsung’s operating income.
The company also has been fighting a bitter legal battle with Apple over copyright infringement claims, and is facing tough competition from Chinese rivals like Huawei and Xiaomi in fast-growing emerging markets.
In response, Samsung has been branching out into new areas like wearable devices and tablets in an effort to protect itself from the competition.
Although Mr. Lee, a billionaire, is not directly overseeing the creation of products, he remains a powerful figure at the company and plays a key role in the company’s strategic plans. He is also chairman of Samsung Group, the conglomerate that includes Samsung Electronics and is also involved in financial services among other businesses. Mr. Lee and his three children control more than 70 companies connected to Samsung Group.
Mr. Lee and Samsung have been known for their aggressive tactics since 1987, when Mr. Lee succeeded his father as chairman.
Over the last 15 years, Samsung’s share price has risen almost 400 percent on the back of consumers’ seemingly insatiable appetite for the company’s products.
Investors, however, are growing wary of the company’s future plans, and some want the tech giant to return part of its large cash stockpile that topped more than $50 billion at the end of last year.
Samsung’s share price has fallen almost 9 percent over the last 12 months, as shareholders fret about its future growth prospects. The company says it will reinvest its large cash war chest in research and development projects and into new sectors like health care.