Samsung appoints Asia heavyweight as legal chief
Electronics giant Samsung has appointed a former United Nations ambassador and South Korean trade minister as its president and chief legal officer. Kim Hyun-Chong will join Samsung on Monday (23 March) in what may be the most senior in-house legal position to date at a major Asian corporation. Samsung spokesman James Chung says the chief legal officer position was a new one at the company and Kim would report directly to chief executive officer Lee Yoon-Woo.The role of in-house lawyers has generally been less pronounced in large Asian corporations than in their American and European counterparts. Relatively few companies have fully-fledged general counsel, with the top legal role frequently filled by a vice president or director instead of a senior-level executive.
March 20, 2009 at 06:22 AM
2 minute read
Electronics giant Samsung has appointed a former United Nations ambassador and South Korean trade minister as its president and chief legal officer.
Kim Hyun-Chong will join Samsung on Monday (23 March) in what may be the most senior in-house legal position to date at a major Asian corporation. Samsung spokesman James Chung says the chief legal officer position was a new one at the company and Kim would report directly to chief executive officer Lee Yoon-Woo.
The role of in-house lawyers has generally been less pronounced in large Asian corporations than in their American and European counterparts. Relatively few companies have fully-fledged general counsel, with the top legal role frequently filled by a vice president or director instead of a senior-level executive.
But Samsung, the world's largest electronics company, has encountered a growing amount of legal strife as it has expanded around the world. In particular, the company is facing a vast number of intellectual property (IP) and anti-dumping cases around the world. Chung said Kim's primary task will be to develop an IP strategy for the company and oversee patent and trade litigation.
Kim served as Korea's representative to the UN in New York from 2007 to 2008 and as the nation's minister of trade from 2004 to 2007. As trade minister, Kim was his nation's chief negotiator in talks with the US over a free trade agreement that was signed in 2007 but still awaits ratification in both nations' legislatures.
Earlier in his career, Kim, who earned both his undergraduate and law degrees at Columbia University, worked as an associate at both Milbank Tweed Hadley & McCloy and Skadden Arps Slate Meagher & Flom in New York. He has also worked as a staff lawyer for the World Trade Organisation in Geneva and for the Korean Foreign Ministry.
For much of last year, Samsung was rocked by a scandal that began when the company's former top in-house lawyer came forward to describe a pattern of corporate bribery of government officials. The accusations led to the resignation and eventual conviction of Samsung's then-chairman, Lee Kun-Hee.
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