Sabotage, espionage, succession battles, and sibling rivalries — it sounds like a season of "Game of Thrones." But it's the real-life drama of the Lee family, the Korean dynasty that founded Samsung with wealth equal to 17% of the country's GDP, according to Bloomberg.
The sprawling Samsung empire, which does far more than just make phones, has grown into its third generation of leadership, with current chairman Lee Byung-chul's son, Lee Jae-yong, poised to build on of his father's foundation.
Of course that's if everything goes to plan. Set to rock the boat is Paul Singer, the American billionaire hedge funder known for taking on entire countries (he once had an Argentine naval vessel impounded). He's pushing to block the sale of Samsung C&T to Cheil, which would ease the generational transfer of power.
It's a fragile situation. A judge should rule on Singer's injunction to stop the sale soon, too. If Lee Jae-yong doesn't navigate this right, there are family members waiting to take his spot.
It all started in 1938 with Lee Byung-chul, $25, and dried fish.
The patriarch and progenitor of the Samsung dynasty opened a tiny dry-goods store. Decades later, his son would launch one of the most coveted cellphones on the market, the Galaxy S, into smartphone stardom.
Lee Byung-chul, however, started with $25 when he opened that first store.
That $25 would spiral into $529.5 billion in assets by 2014.
In 2012, Samsung's revenue was equal to 17% of South Korea's GDP, according to Bloomberg.
According to Samsung's corporate website, the Lee family has a hand in (but not limited to):
- Smartphones and mobile devices, TVs, cameras, and other consumer products, flagship company Samsung Electronics
- Electronics parts, including lithium-ion batteries, chips, semiconductors, hard drives, and more for clients including Apple, HTC, and Sony, Samsung Electronics
- Clothing and luxury retail, entertainment, and theme parks, Samsung Everland/Cheil Industries
- Hospitality, hotels, resorts, and duty-free shops, Hotel Shilla
- Construction, investment, and trading (which extends the companies control into natural resources including coal and gas, as well as wind power, steel, chemicals, and textiles), Samsung C&T
- Life Insurance, Samsung Life Insurance
- Information technology, Samsung SDS
- Advertising and marketing, Cheil Worldwide
- Shipbuilding, Samsung Heavy Industry
- Surveillance, aeronautics, and weapons technology, Samsung Techwin
The scion of the family and chairman of Samsung electronics: Lee Kun-hee.
He presides over the family owned conglomerate. The structure is called chaebol in South Korea. It's a crisscrossed network of companies where members of the family own a little piece of everything.
It's confusing to say the least — making succession and ownership a little less clear.
For example, Samsung is an affiliate of Cheil but to make succession easier and Cheil announced that it wants to buy Samsung for $9 billion.
See the rest of the story at Business Insider