Samsung Electronics has named Kwon Oh-hyun as its new CEO, replacing 61-year-old Choi Gee-sung. Kwon has been running the Korean conglomerate’s components business, where he helped the company expand into logic chips.
As CEO, Kwon will now assume control of Samsung’s blockbuster mobile device business. Samsung recently surpassed Apple as the world’s top seller of smartphones, and overtook Nokia as the leading vendor of all types of mobile phones.
Choi Gee-sung’s new position will be head of corporate strategy for Samsung Group, the parent company of Samsung Electronics and 80 other companies.
Kwon has very close ties to Jay Y. Lee, 43, the only son of Samsung Group Chairman Lee Kun-hee, who returned to lead the company two years ago after being sentenced to jail for tax evasion. (The Korean president pardoned him so that he could return to Samsung.) Lee is widely expected to succeed his father as chairman of Samsung Group.
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