Samsung Electronics co-CEO dies, leaving new appointee in charge

Han Jong-hee, the co-chief executive of Samsung Electronics has died of a heart attack, leaving newly-appointed boss Jun Young-hyun solely in charge of the South Korean tech giant.

Jun was only appointed as Samsung's co-CEO last week at its annual shareholders meeting.

He will be taking the reins while Samsung Electronics is in the midst of revamping its underperforming chip business and navigating trade uncertainties.

While Samsung has reclaimed its position as the world's biggest memory chipmaker in 2024, it has been suffering from weak earnings and a sagging share price in recent quarters after falling behind rivals in advanced memory chips and contract chip manufacturing, which have enjoyed strong demand from AI projects.

Han, 63, was appointed co-vice chairman and CEO in 2022 and was also in charge of consumer electronics and mobile business.

Han joined the company in 1988 and spent most of his career in TV-related divisions, during which the company became the world's leading TV manufacturer.

He played a key role in getting Samsung's high-end TV sets noticed worldwide.

"His numerous other innovations enabled the company to continually demonstrate its technology leadership," the firm said in a company biography published earlier this month.

Han died in hospital on Tuesday while being treated for cardiac arrest and is survived by his wife and three children.

His successor has not yet been decided, a company spokesperson said.

A difficult year

At the shareholder meeting Han chaired last week, he told investors that 2025 would be a difficult year and Samsung would flexibly respond to US President Donald Trump's tariffs with its global supply chain and manufacturing footprints.

He and other executives were grilled by shareholders at the meeting after the company's failure to ride an AI boom made it one of the worst-performing tech stocks last year.

In semiconductors, Samsung lags behind SK Hynix in so-called high bandwidth memory (HBM) chips that Nvidia NVDA.O and others rely on for AI graphic processing units.

"First and foremost, I sincerely apologise for the recent stock performance not meeting your expectations," Han said.

"Over the past year, our company failed to adequately respond to the rapidly evolving AI semiconductor market."

Sources have said Samsung is also seeking to expand its presence in the automotive electronics market to drive new growth.

Samsung chairman Lee Jae-yong, who is in China this week to attend the China Development Forum, visited Xiaomi's 1810.HK car factory in Beijing and BYD's 1211.HK headquarters in Shenzhen, according to photos posted on Chinese social media app and local media reports.

Reuters/AFP