Samsung Electronics and its unions held their first wage talks Tuesday at the company’s plant in Yongin, Gyeonggi Province, industry sources said. Samsung‘s management and the unions will continue their negotiations in the following weeks to decide changes to union members’ terms of employment. Unionized workers have demanded a uniform raise in salary by 10 million won ($8,400), plus cash and stock bonuses worth 4.5 million won in total. The union also requests managemen

Japan’s export restrictions on three key industrial materials critical for South Korea’s chip and display industries has had little impact against the target materials, but worsened overall trade between the two countries, a major business representation group here said Tuesday. Releasing an analysis, the Federation of Korean Industries urged Japan and its new Prime Minister Fumio Kishida to lift the export restrictions the country imposed against Korea in July 2019. According t

South Korean shipbuilder Hanjin Heavy Industries & Construction Co. said Tuesday that it has obtained a 310.5 billion won ($261.4 million) order to build four container carriers. Under the deal with a European shipper, Hanjin Heavy will deliver the vessels by November, 2023, the company said in a regulatory filing. In April, creditors of Hanjin Heavy, led by the state-run Korea Development Bank (KDB), signed a deal with a consortium led by local builder Dongbu Corp. to sell it a 66.85 percen

Daewoo Shipbuilding & Marine Engineering Co. (DSME) said Tuesday that it has won approval for the design of its cyber safety solutions for ships from ABS, a US ship quality assurance and risk management company. The solutions, named DSME Smartship Solutions (DS4), will be used to protect the data and software of ships from outside hacking, the shipbuilder said in an emailed statement. The PDA (product design assessment) approval for the DS4 means the DS4 is designed under the standard for th

Apple Inc.'s new smartwatch will be launched in South Korea next week, the US tech titan said Tuesday, as it eyes to beef up its presence on the home turf of its archrival Samsung Electronics Co. Apple Watch Series 7 will be available here from Oct. 15, with preorders starting from Friday, according to the company. Its starting price has been set at 499,000 won ($420). Apple's latest smartwatch features a nearly 20-percent-larger screen and 40-percent-thinner bezel than its predecessor at 1.7 mi

LG Electronics Inc. said Tuesday it has expanded its technology discussion group as the company tries to better explore its future growth engines. LG Electronics said its Innovation Council now involves other LG Group affiliates, including South Korea's No. 1 chemical company LG Chem Ltd., telecommunications giant LG Uplus Corp. and IT service arm LG CNS Co. The Innovation Council, a networking group with industry experts, was launched by LG Electronics in July 2020 to seek new business opportun

Samsung Display Co., a major display panel maker in South Korea, dominated the global smartphone panel market in the first half of the year, a report showed Tuesday, though its market share declined slightly from a year earlier. Samsung Display, an affiliate of top smartphone maker Samsung Electronics Co., grabbed a 48 percent revenue share in the global smartphone display panel market in the first six months of 2021, down from a 50 percent share a year earlier, according to a report from market

South Korea's antitrust regulator said Tuesday it plans to complete its review within this year of a deal by Korean Air Lines Co., the country's biggest carrier, to buy the debt-ridden Asiana Airlines Inc. In a report to the National Assembly, the Korean Fair Trade Commission (KFTC) said it plans to speed up the review in consideration of the value that the deal has for the country's economy. In November 2020, Korean Air said it will acquire its smaller rival Asiana Airlines in a deal valued at

Samsung Electronics Co. and its union will have their first wage talks Tuesday as the tech giant is moving to create a healthy labor-management culture following its leader's commitment to scrap the conglomerate's "no labor union" policy. Representatives from Samsung's management and the union will hold the first round of wage talks at its plant in Yongin, 49 kilometers south of Seoul. It will be the first wage negotiations since Lee Jae-yong, the leader of Samsung Group, in May 2020 v

Global airlines on Monday projected a sharp reduction in industry losses next year as a multispeed recovery from the coronavirus crisis gets under way, but revised up the financial toll inflicted by the pandemic in 2020 and 2021. The International Air Transport Association, the industry's main trade body, predicted that net losses at airlines would narrow to $11.6 billion in 2022 from $51.8 billion this year.The losses for 2021 were revised up from $47.7 billion estimated in April. IATA also r

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Sales at local convenience stores continued to increase despite economic setbacks from COVID-19, government data showed Monday. The convenience store sector was the only retail sector that continued to post growth during the first eight months of this year, the Ministry of Trade, Industry and Energy added. During the January-August period, sales at convenience stores increased by 6 percent on average from a year earlier. The trend was especially strong in March and April, when the respective

The country‘s largest food delivery firm Baedal Minjok has been selected as the least accessible and friendly application for older people and those with disabilities, a local lawmaker said Monday. According to lawmaker Yang Jeong-suk, who quoted the Ministry of Science and ICT’s report, Baemin ranked at the bottom among the top 300 most-downloaded apps that the ministry reviewed. The 300 apps were evenly split -- with a half available for Apple and the other half for Android. The

Baristas and employees of Starbucks Korea are fuming over excessive workload, after a recent marketing event drew customers lining up for hours. 　  Saying the company has no consideration for the working conditions of its already-overworked staff, the employees said they may stage their first-ever collection action this week.   A staffer at the US-based coffee chain, who requested anonymity, confirmed to The Korea Herald on Monday that workers are planning a rally this week. The

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