Samsung reshuffles top brass; Co-CEO to control memory business

Samsung Electronics Co., the world’s No. 1 memory chipmaker, reshuffled its leadership on Wednesday in a sweeping move as it faces an uphill battle against rivals such as SK Hynix Inc. and Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co.

The South Korean tech giant appointed Jun Young-hyun, vice chairman and chief executive of Samsung’s Device Solutions (DS) division, which oversees its semiconductor business, as its co-CEO.

He will jointly lead Samsung with Han Jong-hee, vice chairman and head of the Device eXperience (DX) division, which oversees the company’s smartphones and consumer electronics business.

Through the two co-CEOs, Samsung said it is transitioning from a single-leadership system under Han to a dual leadership structure.

As a new co-CEO, Vice Chair Jun will take control of Samsung’s memory business and head the Samsung Advanced Institute of Technology.

NEW FOUNDRY CHIEF, FOUNDRY CFO NEWLY CREATED

Samsung promoted Han Jin-man, executive vice president of Samsung's US semiconductor business, to president and named him to lead its foundry business, which has been incurring substantial losses.

He previously worked in design teams for DRAM and flash memory and led solid-state drive development and strategic marketing.

The new Samsung foundry leader will be tasked with securing large companies such as Qualcomm, AMD and Nvidia as its clients.

The company said it has created the chief technology officer (CTO) position for its foundry business to strengthen its contract chipmaking business.

Nam Seok-woo, the new foundry CTO, was previously president and head of FAB Engineering & Operations. Samsung said he is an expert in semiconductor process development and manufacturing with extensive experience in memory process and foundry manufacturing technology.

Nam will be tasked with closing Samsung’s widening gap with foundry leader TSMC.

To bolster its semiconductor business, Samsung promoted Kim Yong-kwan, former executive vice president of a business support task force, to president of management strategy in the Device Solutions division.

The latest reshuffle affected seven other officials, who have been reassigned to new positions, alongside two promotions to CEO posts.

OTHER EXECUTIVE SHAKE-UP

Vice Chairman and co-CEO Han Jong-hee will also lead a newly formed committee that will focus on strengthening product quality across the company.

Ko Han-sung, CEO of Samsung Bioepis Co., a biopharmaceutical research and development unit of Samsung Group, has been named to head Samsung Electronics’ Future Business Planning division, a position previously held by Kyung Kye-hyun, to lead efforts at finding new growth opportunities.

Lee Won-jin Lee, originally from Google, was named president and head of the Global Marketing office. He was previously an executive advisor for Samsung Electronics.

Samung Electronics CFO Park Hark-kyu will move to the Business Support Task Force.

Lee Young-hee, Samsung's first female president and head of the Global Marketing office in the DX division, will assume a new role as a Brand Strategy Committee member.

UPHILL BATTLE

Samsung faces growing policy risks associated with the incoming US administration of President-elect Donald Trump as well as the ongoing legal risks surrounding Chairman Lee Jae-yong, who also goes by the name Jay Y. Lee.

Through the drastic organizational revamp and executive job cuts, Samsung aims to sharpen the competitive edge of its microchip business, particularly in AI chips such as high-bandwidth memory.

Among the semiconductor Big Three — Samsung, SK Hynix and Micron Technology — Samsung is the only one that doesn’t supply the latest AI chip, HBM3E, to Nvidia, the world’s top AI chip designer.

Samsung does supply fourth-generation 8-layer HBM3 chips in small quantities to Nvidia.

SK Hynix, the world’s No. 2 memory chipmaker and the HBM chip leader, has been supplying 8-layer HBM3 chips in large quantities since March and plans to deliver a more advanced 12-layer version starting in the fourth quarter.

Write to Jeong-Soo Hwang, Chae-Yeon Kim and Eui-Myung Park at hjs@hankyung.com
In-Soo Nam edited this article.