Three heads better than one? Samsung adds two new CEOs

By Trevor Mogg March 15, 2013

JK Shin Samsung — Image used with permission by copyright holder

Thursday was an eventful day for Samsung’s Kiho Shin. As the tech company’s president and head of IT and mobile communications stood on stage at Radio City Music Hall in New York introducing his company’s next big thing, Samsung HQ issued a release announcing he was being promoted to CEO.

Shin Samsung — Samsung’s JK Shin Image used with permission by copyright holder

On top of that, Boo-keun Yoon, president of Samsung Electronics, was also being promoted to the top job.

The pair join the current CEO, Oh-Hyun Kwon, so Samsung now has not one, not two, but three CEOs – or co-CEOs – running the company.

According to Samsung’s release, Yoon will carry on overseeing the consumer electronics division, while Shin will continue focusing on the IT and mobile communications business. Kwon will remain in charge of Samsung’s component division.

“The new appointments recognize the strong performance of President Yoon and President Shin,” Samsung said in its release. “Under President Yoon, Samsung’s TV business maintained and solidified its global leadership position after becoming global number one in 2006. Under President Shin, Samsung’s mobile business posted significant growth and attained global number one position in smartphones in 2011 and in overall mobile phones in 2012.”

The company said the new leadership structure would help to “clarify and enhance” the management of the various businesses within the organization. In others words, it hopes the changes will help the tech giant to build on recent successes which saw the company, in the final three months of 2012, sell an estimated 63 million phones worldwide, causing profits to leap by an impressive 76 percent on a year earlier.

[via engadget]

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Not so many moons ago, Trevor moved from one tea-loving island nation that drives on the left (Britain) to another (Japan)…

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