Samsung Electronics Co., the world’s top maker of smartphones and memory chips, said Tuesday that it has been selected to provide secure contactless smart card chips to the Association of German Transport Undertakings.It marked the first time that Samsung made inroads into the German transportation card market, in close collaboration with its business partners including the OS solution provider ZeitControl cardsystems GmbH.The association is expected to issue about eight million transportation c

POSCO Energy, the energy affiliate of POSCO, completed construction on a 5-megawatt expansion to its solar power plant in Sinan County, South Jeolla Province, Tuesday. The Sinan Solar Power Plant, now with a total capacity of 7 megawatts, was built on salt ponds that had been abandoned for years. It is expected to produce 9,300 megawatt-hours of electricity a year, which is enough to power 3,000 homes annually for the next 20 years, according to company officials. By 2014, the plant will reach a

The National Tax Service on Tuesday launched an investigation into four units of Lotte Shopping, which marked the first time in four years since September 2009.The tax agency dispatched some 150 inspectors into the headquarters of Lotte Department Store, Lotte Mart, Lotte Super and Lotte Cinema in Seoul to secure computer hard disks and internal financial statements.Market insiders alleged that the NTS will focus their probe on whether some of the Lotte units exploited tax loopholes or engaged i

POSCO, the nation’s top steelmaker, said on Tuesday it decided to pull out of a $5.3 billion steel mill construction project in Karnataka, a state in southwestern India, mainly due to opposition from local residents.The decision came as the company failed to make any progress in purchasing land for the construction in the Gadag district of central Karnataka for the past three years. Gadag is located near Bellary district, which has the highest deposits of iron ore in Karnataka. “Instead of dropp

A senior manager from one of the world’s leading data storage business firms said Tuesday that demand for hard disk drives would continue to rise despite increasing demand for smaller, faster solid-state drives. In the current digital age when every minute, 30 hours of video are posted on YouTube; 100,000 are Twitter; 6 million posted on Facebook; and 20 million photos are uploaded to Flickr, according to leading data storage firm Western Digital Corp, the importance of storage technology cannot

Jeju Island is reflecting policymakers’ calls to revitalize the nation’s international education, including in the English language, according to a research report from the Korea Development Institute.There are three international schools for elementary, junior high and high schools students located in the Jeju Special Self-Governing Province.Among them are Canada-based Branksome Hall Asia and U.K.-based North London Collegiate School Jeju, both of which are located in the southwestern part of J

South Korean stocks closed 0.47 percent lower Tuesday ahead of U.S. Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke's speech on monetary policy slated for this week, analysts said. The local currency gained against the U.S. dollar.The benchmark Korea Composite Stock Price Index (KOSPI) fell 8.8 points to finish at 1,866.36. Trading volume was moderate at 300 million shares worth 2.9 trillion won (US$2.63 billion) with gainers outpacing losers 405 to 393.Analysts said the market decline came as investors t

South Korean stocks opened lower Tuesday on losses in shares of large-cap exporters, analysts said. The benchmark Korea Composite Stock Price Index (KOSPI) fell 4.59 points, or 0.24 percent, to 1,870.75 in the first 15 minutes of trading. Market bellwether Samsung Electronics slipped 0.8 percent, with Hyundai Heavy Industries, the world's largest shipyard, shedding 0.3 percent. Net selling by foreigners and institutions lent support to the main index's bearish start, analysts added. The local cu