SK chief Chey to co-lead chipmaker Hynix

Group chairman says he will take opposition to him as a call to make company better one


Hynix Semiconductor said on Tuesday that SK Group chairman Chey Tae-won will jointly lead the chipmaker with its current chief executive Kwon Oh-chul.

Chey was given the thumbs up to co-lead the world’s No. 2 computer memory chipmaker in a meeting of the nine-member board composed on Monday.

The board of directors also selected SK Telecom president Ha Sung-min as the head of the board committee. The selection of the co-CEO and the board chairman means the completion of SKT’s process to take over Hynix.

The four inside directors of Hynix are Chey, Kwon, Ha and Hynix vice president Park Sung-wook. There are also five outside directors ― which includes four professors and a lawyer ― for the company.

SK Group chairman Chey Tae-won (second from right) takes questions from reporters as he enters the Hynix building in southern Seoul to attend a board meeting where he was appointed co-CEO of the chipmaker on Tuesday. (Hynix)

“Hynix is one of our country’s most representative semiconductor firms. Many people wondered how Hynix and SK could create synergy and I believe SK’s globalization projects, such as overseas exports and projects which are based in foreign countries, are what could be of help to Hynix,” Chey told reporters before attending the board meeting.

He also said he was aware of the opposition voices raised over his position at the stakeholders meeting on Monday, adding that it would take it as a call to transform Hynix into a better company.

Earlier on Monday, controversy escalated when Chey was named an inside director for Hynix at its stakeholders’ meeting. It was unclear if the board meeting will be held as scheduled after two commissioners, who are authorized to exercise the votes of Hynix’s major stakeholder National Pension Service, stepped down from their seats in protest of the nomination.

Some stakeholders claimed the time was not right to give the director position to Chey when he was still under investigation from the prosecution.

But industry insiders say Chey’s determination to spearhead the semiconductor firm ― which is likely to be named SK Hynix ― was too strong to be beaten by such opposition, going ahead with the board meeting as it was organized.

Hynix CEO Kwon also told stakeholders at its meeting that the immediate participation of Chey in business operations was necessary for the rapidly changing semiconductor industry needed fast investment decisions.

Hynix said at its earnings briefing earlier this month that it will inject 4.2 trillion won ($3.73 billion) in facility investments this year, up 20 percent from the previous year despite unfavorable market conditions in the industry.

It will spend 60 percent on NAND Flash memory, used in smartphones and tablet PCs, different from last year when it put in 70 percent of facility investments in dynamic random access memory.

With plans to possibly increase the 2012 investment figure, the company will also focus on nurturing research and development workforces and launching projects in the non-memory System LSI sector, according to SK executives.

By Cho Ji-hyun (sharon@heraldcorp.com)