South Korea’s top 10 conglomerates, including Samsung and Hyundai Motor, have been expanding the number of areas they do business in over the last decade, data showed Wednesday.

The country’s 10 biggest family-owned conglomerates had companies in 56 industries as of late last year, up 43.5 percent from 39 in 2001, according to the data by the Fair Trade Commission and the Financial Supervisory Service.

The data also showed that business operations of the so-called chaebol were present in 73.4 percent of the total 76 industry categories.

Hyundai Heavy Industries registered the biggest growth, with the number of industries its subsidiaries operate in growing five-fold to 15 sectors.

Samsung expanded its business into 26 areas, up from 20, while Hyundai more than doubled the figure to 21 from 10, according to the data.

Meanwhile, the data showed that chaebols newly expanded into industries that included apparel, accessories and shoes, and furniture over the past decade.

The restaurant industry and medical product manufacturing were also areas the 10 conglomerates freshly entered to secure new profit sources.

The conglomerates’ business operations focused the most on the chemical industry, with a total of 38 affiliates operating in the sector.

As of end-2011, local conglomerates owned 592 affiliates, nearly a two-fold rise from the 303 units 10 years earlier, according to the data. (Yonhap News)