Google’s artificial intelligence program AlphaGo defeated Korean Go champion Lee Se-dol in their historic first showdown Wednesday.In a landmark match held at the Four Seasons Hotel in Seoul, the Google AI beat Lee by resignation in 186 moves after a fierce tug of war for more than 3 1/2 hours. “I was really surprised. I didn’t think I could lose,” Lee said at a press conference after the match. “I didn’t think AlphaGo would play in such a perfect manner. I like to express my respect to the Goog

LG Group chairman Koo Bon-moo stressed “insight and action” for the group’s next big leap at an executive meeting in Seoul on Tuesday. “At a time of technological convergence and fierce competition across industries, we are experiencing destructive changes,” he said. “We should focus on our strengths to further elevate our competitiveness.” Koo Bon-moo. (Illustration By Park Gee-young)LG, the nation’s fourth-largest conglomerate, has continued business restructuring centered on its next growth e

OCHANG, North Chungcheong Province -- An automated assembly line at chemical and battery firm LG Chem’s Ochang Plant 1 here was busily ferrying a long battery separator sheet attached with positive and negative plates.Along the assembly line, the sheet was folded, or rather rolled, in layers and then cut and packaged to turn into square, thin pouch-type battery cells.The lithium-ion battery cells will later be mounted on electric cars of around 20 global automotive makers, including Ford, Volksw

Tensions are growing high at Cheil Worldwide, the advertising unit of Samsung Group that has been widely rumored to be merging with French ad giant Publicis Groupe within the first half of this year. According to industry sources, Cheil has continued talks to sell off a controlling 28.28 percent stake that is owned by Samsung C&T, Samsung Electronics and Samsung Card to Publicis. Even though the company has not yet confirmed the deal, a sense of anxiety is already prevalent among Cheil workers.

Former CEO of Google and executive chairman of the parent company, Alphabet, Eric Schmidt is scheduled to visit Seoul on Tuesday to attend the historic Go match between top player Lee Se-dol and Google’s artificial intelligence program AlphaGo.  The five-day games will be held at a Seoul hotel on March 9, 10, 12, 13 and 15. There is a $1 million prize for the winner. All the matches will be live-streamed via YouTube. Schmidt is also expected to attend the gala dinner on the eve of the first matc

Olympus, the Japanese maker of medical and surgical solutions, Thursday held a groundbreaking ceremony of its new medical training center in Songdo, Incheon. The Olympus Korea Training and Education Center aims to offer diverse training programs for health professionals on the safe and effective use of the company’s medical and surgical products, including its market No. 1 endoscopy equipment.  With a budget of 36.3 billion won ($29.3 million), the new center, the sixth of its kind globally and

Samsung Electronics said Thursday it will start mass production of the industry’s first 256-gigabyte Universal Flash Storage from next month for smartphones, with twice the processing speed compared to conventional chips used in PCs. The Korean tech giant, which is also the world’s biggest memory chipmaker, said the new chip will go into high-end mobile devices but didn’t name possible products and clients.  According to the company, the chip has a reading speed of 850 megabytes per second and w

Samsung Group said Thursday Samsung Electronics vice chairman and heir apparent Lee Jae-yong has repurchased treasury shares of Samsung C&T and Samsung Engineering, worth a combined 230 billion won ($185 million). Lee acquired 1.3 million shares -- about 200 billion won -- of Samsung C&T, the de facto holding company, from Samsung SDI, the battery-making unit. Samsung Electronics vice chairman Lee Jae-yong“The buyback aims to minimize the market impact, including any damage to minority sharehold

Mobile messenger operator Kakao on Wednesday launched navigation app KakaoNavi, which allows users to share locations, destinations, and travel time with their friends on the KakaoTalk messenger. The new app is the upgraded version of Kimgisa that the Korean IT giant acquired for 62.6 billion won ($50 million) last year. (Kakao)

Mobile chiefs of Samsung Electronics and LG Electronics made their debuts at Mobile World Congress, the mobile industry’s largest gathering held in Barcelona, Spain, this week. LG has usually launched its new phones after MWC but this year the company went head-on with its local rival Samsung. As much as their latest phones, presentations made by the mobile chiefs of both companies grabbed a lot of attention from industry people and journalists. Samsung’s mobile chief Koh Dong-jin, 55, is an eng

Samsung Electronics’ mobile payments service Samsung Pay has hit 5 million subscribers, with combined transactions exceeding $500 million in Korea and the U.S. since its debut in August. The Korean tech giant said Saturday it will start the service in China in March and other countries such as Australia, Brazil, Singapore, Spain, the U.K. and Canada in phases later this year.  Detailed plans for its future launches and partnerships with local banks and card issuers are expected to be revealed du

Samsung Electronics is expected to complete the relocation of its Seoul offices to Suwon, Gyeonggi Province, next month, a move that is widely considered part of Samsung Group’s ongoing business restructuring. Even though the tech giant has been headquartered in Suwon where its production facilities are based since 1973, the Seoul office has played a control tower role together with Samsung Corporate Strategy Office that oversees all group companies. Samsung Group has created the so-called “Sams

The world’s first braille smartwatch, developed by a Korean start-up, will make its debut at the upcoming Mobile World Congress, the telecom industry’s largest gathering in Barcelona next week. According to the developer Dot, the device has 30 braille dots on the watch face so that blind people can send text messages without limitations. Thanks to a special module set that has drastically reduced the size of the device, the price has also become affordable at about $300.  While the current voice

The nation’s top three telecom carriers – SK Telecom, KT and LG Uplus – plan to offer the world’s fastest tri-band LTE service from March when updated handsets are launched.The breakthrough comes as they have succeeded in applying the 256 Quadrature Amplitude Modulation or QAM software technology that bundles more bits into the spectrum being used.　According to LG Uplus Tuesday, the application, the first of its kind in the world, will enhance data transmission speeds and network capacity by abo

Speculation has been growing about Samsung Electronics vice chairman and Samsung Group heir apparent Lee Jae-yong’s recently acquired cash totaling 300 billion won ($250 million).  In December, he secured the money by selling a 2.05 percent stake in Samsung SDS to participate in Samsung Engineering’s planned capital increase. Despite his plan to buy shares when there was a lack of applications, investors purchased most of the shares, worth 1.2 trillion won, that were issued last week. Now indust

 LG Electronics said Thursday a new street named after its corporate name has been created within an industrial complex in Changwon, the capital city of South Gyeongsang Province. LG Jeonja-ro, meaning “LG Electronics Street” in English, stretches some 500 meters in the neighborhood of its production plant.  The Changwon city government said the street was designated to honor the company’s continuing investments and job creations in the city even at a time of economic difficulties. The name has

LG CNS, the information technology solutions unit of LG Group, said Thursday it has won a deal to install bus traffic control systems for Malaysia’s Mass Rapid Transit railway stations.  (LG CNS)The $120 million MRT project aims to connect every corner of Kuala Lumpur via high-speed trains. The Line 1, stretching about 51 kilometers with 31 stations, is under construction and slated for completion by 2017. LG CNS has already participated in the project, as it secured a deal in 2012 to build tele

Kal Raman, former CEO of Xome and chief operating officer of Groupon, has joined Samsung Electronics America as chief digital officer to lead the company’s e-commerce business, the Seoul head office confirmed Thursday.  Raman, 47, has served in executive roles at Amazon, eBay, Drugstore.com and Groupon. He is currently based in Seattle.Over the past year, he was CEO of Xome, an online home-buying service affiliated with Nationstar Mortgage.A veteran in technology and retail business, Raman was a

Dyson, the U.K. home appliance maker, held a rare performance test in Seoul on Tuesday by comparing its own luxurious stick vacuum cleaner with cheaper competitors. During the event, Dyson’s motor drive engineer Graham Donald demonstrated the suction power of the company’s V6 Fluffy cleaner and the key technologies behind the device. Then, a “blind test” was carried out. He and two other staff members carrying three different stick vacuums started to collect baking power scattered on separate bl

LG Group said Wednesday it has decided to hire a marine staff sergeant who recently saved a blind man’s life at a subway station in Daegu. On Jan. 17, the 24-year-old Choi Hyung-soo jumped onto the tracks to save a 40-something blind man who missed his footing and fell. After confirming the man was safe, he left the scene without revealing himself. However, his live-saving act was publicized by the media. LG said it would offer him a full scholarship when he returns to college and hire him after