The Galaxy smartphones, dazzling TVs, or strong memory chips are what most people think of when they hear the word Samsung. But the Samsung...
The Galaxy smartphones, dazzling TVs, or strong memory chips are what most people think of when they hear the word Samsung. But the Samsung Group is actually a lot bigger than that. Samsung isn't just one firm; it's a huge, sprawling, and chaebol (which means monopoly) kind of family-run economic organization in South Korea.
The Samsung Group is the main company at the center.
A huge network of affiliates surrounds it. Many of these affiliates are publicly listed enterprises that work on their own.
A Short History of the Samsung Group
Lee Byung-Chull started Samsung on March 1, 1938, as a grocery business. He began his company in Taegu, Korea, where he traded noodles and other items made in and around the city and sent them to China and its regions. The name of the corporation, Samsung, comes from the Korean term for "three stars."
The black-and-white televisions were Samsung's first electronics product, which came out in 1969. In the 1970s, the firm started sending home electronics items to other countries. Samsung was already a big company in Korea at that time, and it owned up to 50% of the production of semiconductors utilized in the tech industry in Korea.
Samsung's manufacturing and sales grew quickly in the late 1970s and early 1980s. They also had a different place to make their electronics and semiconductors, and in 1978 they started an aircraft section. Samsung Data Systems (now Samsung SDS) was founded in 1985 to meet the rising need for systems development from enterprises. This helped Samsung swiftly become a leader in IT services. Samsung also built two research and development centers that helped the business expand its technological portfolio to include electronics, semiconductors, high-polymer chemicals, genetic engineering tools, telecommunications, aerospace, and nanotechnology.
The Lee family now runs Samsung, but the business is still influenced by a complicated network of cross-shareholdings. This gives Samsung a degree of power and reach that few other companies in the world can match.
Big Subsidiaries and Areas of Business
Samsung's empire goes well beyond just making goods for people. Here is a list of its most important subsidiaries:
Samsung Electronics
The best-known and most important part of the Samsung brand. It's the biggest company in the world that makes smartphones, TVs, and memory chips. There are four main parts of its business:
Mobile eXperience (MX): This includes the Galaxy range of smartphones (including the Z foldables), tablets, wearables, and earbuds.
Visual Display: This is where Samsung's high-end QLED, OLED, and Neo QLED TVs, as well as monitors and digital displays, are made.
Digital Appliances: This group includes things we use every day, such refrigerators, washing machines, and air conditioners.
Device Solutions (DS): Samsung's semiconductor powerhouse makes DRAM, NAND storage, SoCs, and CPUs for its own gadgets and those of other tech titans.