KT TO BUILD SMART FARMS -- Yoon Kyung-lim(left), head of mobile carrier KT’s future convergence business office, and Katsuyuki Kitagawa, CEO of ASO Farm Land -- operator of the world’s largest agriculture-themed park in Japan -- pose at the MOU signing event to collaborate on building smart farms in Korea, deploying information technology. (KT)

Controversy over a Taiwan-born K-pop singer, who became the center of a political dispute between China and Taiwan for holding the national flag of the island nation on a TV show, is affecting the IT sector in Korea.Mobile carrier LG Uplus said Monday that it would “temporarily stop the online commercials for Chinese handset-maker Huawei’s Y6 smartphone,” featuring Chou Tzu-yu, better known as Tzu-yu here, a member of multinational K-pop band Twice.LG Uplus’ online commercial for Huawei’s Y6 sma

While SKT calls the deal crucial for survival, rivals resist citing monopoly concerns

Samsung Electronics on Sunday unveiled a transparent OLED, or organic light-emitting diode, display video wall at the BMW Driving Center in Yeongjongdo Island, Incheon. The futuristic display, boasting a 45 percent transparency rate, allows visitors to see every corner of the BMW 7 Series sedan. (Samsung Electronics)

 SK Telecom on Sunday unveiled its new budget smartphone, Sol, before its official launch Friday. Priced at 399,300 won ($330), the phone features a 5.5-inch full HD display, polycarbonate case and Qualcomm’s 1.5-gigahertz octacore processor. SKT

A few years ago, office worker Lee Yu-na had a nightmare finding parking space when visiting Bukchon Hanok Village, one of the popular tourist destinations in northern Seoul. Despite her unsavory memory of paying fines for parking her car in a no-parking area, she had to visit the village again last month, on request by her friend from the U.S. But this time she felt more confident. A smart parking lot management solution developed by smart parking app operator ParkingCloud is installed at the J

SmartThings, a U.S. smart home start-up acquired by Samsung Electronics last August, will enter the Korean market in the first quarter of this year, company officials said Friday. The South Korean tech giant snapped up the fast-growing Internet of Things start-up in a $200 million deal under its vision to have all its appliances connected to the Web by 2020.SmartThings’ mobile app for the connected home.Samsung confirmed that it will roll out SmartThings products, including a smart hub and multi

Marking its third anniversary Friday, Naver’s webfiction service has shown rapid growth, with the number of subscribers surpassing 5 million, up 53 percent from 2013, according to the Internet giant.The monthly sales of Web novels published on the platform also hit the 100-million won ($82,800) mark.  Naver’s Web novel platform. (Naver)Currently, 150 authors have rolled out 197 Web novels over the past three years. Ninety-seven writers published 117 literary works on the online platform last yea

Aiming to counter tumbling demand for chips due mainly to the saturated global smartphone and PC chip markets, SK hynix announced Thursday a plan to invest 6 trillion won ($4.95 billion) this year.The company will match last year’s investment to conduct research and development for new chip technology, acquire a competitive edge in price, and build new production lines, according to the firm. The logo of SK hynix is on a company office window. (Yonhap)Specifically, the company will speed up the

Samsung Electronics said Thursday that it has started mass production of its own flagship mobile chip Exynos 8 Octa and Qualcomm’s Snapdragon 820, to be fitted on premium smartphone models, including the Galaxy S7. The chips are built on a new technology, called the 14-nanometer low-power plus process, the second generation of the firm’s 14-nm FinFET process technology first adopted by the Seoul-based firm last year to build the Exynos 7 Octa, the system-on-a-chip that powers the Galaxy S6. Sams

LG RELEASES LIGHTEST 15-INCH LAPTOP -- LG Electronics rolled out the world’s lightest 15.6-inch laptop, dubbed the Gram 15, in Seoul on Thursday. The new laptop weighing in at 980 grams -- 50 percent lighter than the existing 15-inch products -- features either Intel‘s i5 or i7 processor, 8GB of RAM and 256 and 512GB storage options, with its price range from 1.55 million won ($1,280) to 2.29 million won.　(LGE)

Kwon Oh-hyun, the CEO and vice chairman of Samsung Electronics, handed a written apology to family members of former workers who contracted deadly diseases including leukemia and various cancers, in Seoul on Thursday. Participating in a meeting with the families of the workers stricken with illnesses at the head office in Gangnam, Seoul on the day, CEO Kwon said “we appreciate your understanding and efforts to solve the issues (related to the dispute involving the former Samsung factory workers)

 LG Electronics rolled out the world’s lightest 15.6-inch laptop, dubbed the Gram 15, in Seoul on Thursday. The new laptop weighing in at 980 grams -- 50 percent lighter than the existing 15-inch products -- features either an i5 or i7 processor, 8GB of RAM and 256 and 512GB storage options with its price range from 1.55 million won ($1,280) to 2.29 million won.　LGE