Under the new structure, India, Nepal, Bangladesh and Sri Lanka, countries which previously fell under the firm's Southeast Asian operations, will be consolidated into a new group called Southwest Asia.
Samsung's Southeast Asian operations will now cover seven countries--Australia, Indonesia, Malaysia, the Philippines, Singapore, Thailand and Vietnam.
Kwang-Soo Kim has been redesignated from his Southeast Asian portfolio to head the new territory. According to him, the move stands testament to the growing importance of emerging markets such as India, which will serve as the headquarters for its Southwest Asian region.
Market watchers have recently spotlighted India as one of the world's fastest-growing handset markets. According to research firm Gartner, the country's mobile subscriber base is expected to grow by 94 percent to 56 million this year. To tap into the projected boom, veterans like Nokia, Sony Ericsson and Siemens, as well as newer Asian phonemakers like Benq and DBTel have all announced plans for the Indian market.
"Our goal is to be India's number one handphone seller by the end of 2004, and I am confident that we can achieve that," Kim said in a statement. The country has been earmarked as one of Samsung's four key markets globally, the others being China, Thailand and the U.S.
Meanwhile, Sang-Jin Park will take over as the CEO for Southeast Asia, the company said. He was previously the executive vice president and general manager of Samsung's Mobile Communication Division in Korea.
"Management adjustments are part of Samsung's yearly planning cycle that adds a level of diversity and innovation to the company," said Park.
The leadership reshuffle also includes two markets in Southeast Asia.
Jeong-Wook Kim, the former managing director of Samsung Malaysia Electronics, will head its Singapore operations. He replaces Tae-Bong Choi, who has been promoted to vice president of sales and marketing for Samsung Thailand.
To fill the void in Malaysia, Jong-Duk Won has been named managing director. Prior to his appointment, Won was a senior executive with Samsung's global marketing operations in Korea.
The company confirmed there will be no structural changes to its remaining Asian operations which include Japan, Korea and Greater China.
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Samsung better revamp their operations here in Asia very soon -- right now if possible.
I've sent a total of 6 emails to complaint about their incompetency in their handphone technology. Surprisingly, there's zero reply from them at all despite I'm selecting different country from Malaysia, Singapore, Korea, US and UK.
What's wrong with them? This makes my purchase of the latest SGH-S500 a total dissapointment.
Posted by anonymous on Friday, February 13 2004 12:19 PM