SINGAPORE – About an hour south of Seoul, bulldozers are demolishing the last vacant factories at Samsung Electronics’s Suwon campus, erasing signs that South Korea’s most valuable public company once made its headquarters in a smoke-fuming industrial complex.
In their place are ice cream and pizza parlors, research labs and parks. Nine cafeterias serve employees from 50 countries.
The 28,000 engineers, designers and marketers who arrive by bicycle or one of 556 company-funded buses at this center could be in Silicon Valley or India except for a sign at the eight-lane entrance: Samsung Digital City.
The campus, along with required English lessons for managers and research into things from solar cells to humanoid robots, are part of Samsung Electronics’ mission to vault itself into the ranks of the world’s great innovators and become one of the top five brands.
“The global list of top companies is being replaced by the likes of Apple, Google and Facebook,” says Choi Gee Sung, 59, in his first interview since becoming chief executive officer in December.
“Our job is to prepare the organization for the next generation so it can continue to evolve into a truly great company. We need to be on our toes.”
To succeed, Samsung – a company with a history of top-down managers and obedient employees – will need to shift strategy, a process for which it has few guideposts.
Samsung has already taken giant steps from its early days as a copycat appliance manufacturer.
Now, as a consumer electronics behemoth, it has expanded beyond South Korea and the nation’s conglomerate-run shipyards, steel mills and auto plants.
Samsung has rocketed past Sony as the largest maker of flat-panel TVs.
It has edged out Hewlett-Packard color laser printers that scan, fax and copy.
It’s also the biggest in liquid-crystal-display TVs and computer monitors. No. 2 in mobile phones, Samsung is pushing the Galaxy S smart phone to challenge Apple’s iPhone and narrow the gap with leader Nokia Oyj.
”In 10 years, the majority of products that represent Samsung may no longer exist,” said Lee Kun Hee, 68, chairman of the electronics unit. “We must have a new start. There is no time to hesitate.”
