The profit portion of South Korea's tech giant Samsung Electronics Co. among its listed group affiliates declined last year from a year earlier as the smartphone maker reported the weakest earnings in three years, data showed Thursday. The tech firm -- the flagship unit of the country's top conglomerate, Samsung Group -- posted 25 trillion won ($22.9 billion) in operating profit for the January-...

LG Electronics Inc., South Korea's leading home appliance and smartphone maker, said Thursday its net loss widened by more than threefold in the fourth quarter of 2014 from a year earlier as it suspended production of plasma display panel (PDP) TVs due to lack of demand. Net loss came to 205.7 billion won (US$189.9 million) in the October-December period, compared with a loss of 63.5 billion won...

SK Telecom Co., the country's top mobile operator, said Thursday its fourth-quarter earnings soared on an increased number of subscribers to its faster mobile Internet connection and a rise in sales from its business solution service. Net profit came to 503.3 billion won (US$465 million) in the October-December period, up 71.4 percent from the 293.6 billion won tallied a year earlier, SK Telecom...

Samsung Electronics Co. set out to reclaim its edge in the handset business that on Thursday revealed its weakest annual earnings in three years for the world's top smartphone maker, as competition is expected to get fiercer with global rivals in both the high- and low-end markets. The tech giant booked a net profit of 23.4 trillion won ($21.6 billion) in 2014, down 23.2 percent from 30.5 trilli...

Naver Corp., South Korea's top Internet portal operator, on Thursday released weaker than expected fourth-quarter earnings, sending its stock price to a one-week low. Net income came to 134.5 billion won (US$124.2 million) in the October-December period, more than doubling from 54.1 billion won a year earlier, the company said in a regulatory filing. But the fourth-quarter reading was well belo...

Leading South Korean companies are likely to hire fewer new employees in 2015 than last year as there is no clear sign of an economic recovery, a poll showed Tuesday. The survey by the Korea Chamber of Commerce and Industry (KCCI), which canvassed the country's top 500 companies by sales, found 180 of them plan to hire 22,844 new workers in 2015, down 2.3 percent from 23,385 last year. Of those ...

South Korean tech giant Samsung Electronics Co. is expected to unveil a near 40-percent jump in cash dividends this week, industry sources said Sunday, following such decisions by Hyundai Motor Co. and Kia Motors Corp. Samsung had paid out a total of 2.16 trillion won ($1.99 billion) in dividends to its shareholders for 2013, or 14,300 won per share, according to the sources. They said that the...

Daewoo Shipbuilding & Marine Engineering Co., the world's second-biggest shipyard, has signed deals worth a combined $800 million to build four liquefied natural gas carriers, the shipbuilder said Thursday. Under the deals signed Wednesday with Korea Line Corp. and Hyundai LNG Shipping Co., the shipbuilder will deliver the LNG carriers by May 2017, the company said in an e-mailed statement. The...

KT&G Corp., South Korea's state-run tobacco producer, said Thursday its net profit jumped 45.5 percent in 2014 from a year earlier, driven by an increase in domesticsales ahead of a sharp price hike. Net income came to 813.8 billion won ($751.9 million) last year, compared with 559.3 billion won in 2013, the company said in a regulatory filing. Operating profit went up 15.6 percent on-year to 1...

South Korea's No. 2 tech giant, LG Electronics Inc., said Thursday that it will roll out its latest version of its curved-smartphone lineup on its home turf later this month and gradually expand its sales to overseas markets. The G Flex 2, with a Full HD 5.5-inch display, will become LG's second smartphone that boasts a display curving inward from top to bottom and slightly from right to left bu...

South Korea's No. 2 tech giant, LG Electronics Inc., is estimated to have posted a 25 percent gain in its smartphone sales last year from a year earlier, industry sources said Thursday, taking a step closer to claiming the third spot in the global market. The combined smartphone shipment of LG Electronics is estimated at 59.6 million units for 2014, up from the 47.6 million units posted a year e...

Hyundai Motor Co.'s labor union said Wednesday it will appeal against a recent court ruling unfavorable to the automaker's employees that said the company should include bonuses as ordinary wages for some workers. Last week, the Seoul Central District Court ordered Hyundai Motor, the country's top automaker, to count regular bonuses as part of ordinary salaries only for some employees and to pay...

Microsoft Korea rolled out its first machine-learning tool in South Korea on Wednesday as the firm moves to expand clout in advanced technology based on fast-growing cloud computing systems. Azure machine-learning, which runs on Microsoft's namesake cloud system, is an analysis platform developed by the U.S. software giant that offers predictions for a specific case set by the user. When a user...

Samsung Electronics Co., South Korea's largest firm by market value, has been considering splitting its stock to lower the high price tag of its shares but will look more into the long-term effect before making any decision, a senior executive said Tuesday. "(Samsung Electronics) has been looking into whether stock splits actually have a positive impact on the company's value," Lee Myung-jin, a ...