Vice President Lee Kwang-koo has been unanimously named to lead Woori Bank as the next president, taking over from President Lee Soon-woo retires on Dec. 31.The President CandidateRecommendation Committee picked Vice President Lee as the next president during its meeting on Dec. 5 from among three candidates whom they met for an interview.
The choice was unanimous and the board of the bank will decide on the committee’s recommendation when it meets on Dec. 9, with a shareholders’ meeting on Dec. 30 to act on the recommendation.
The president-designate won the recommendation with a plan to increase the bank’s earnings to boost the corporate value, which he says will help the privatization of the bank. He was said to have presented his detailed plan to boost the bank’s earnings to impress the members of the committee during an interview.
Lee, a graduate of Sogang University in Seoul, started his banking career with the Commercial Bank of Korea in 1979, which later merged with other banks to be renamed Woori Bank. He held a number of important positions before rising to vice president, including manager of the Hong Kong branch, manager of the Individual Banking Strategy Dep’t., and assistant president in charge of the Management Planning Headquarters, before getting promoted to his current position as vice president in charge of Individual Customer Headquarters.
The president-designate said at the interview he had with the personnel committee that he will try to lead Woori Bank to boost growth of its assets, which will help its privatization bid. The plan calls for making the bank more attractive to investors to buy stakes currently held by the government. He will try to boost assets by 15 trillion won each year so that Woori Bank will be one of the leading banks in Asia. That, he says, will go a long way in making the bank attractive enough to investors.
He will take advantage of its strong operational network and upgrade its earning levels, which is another way he hopes to make the bank more attractive to potential investors. The bank’s assets would grow to around 300 trillion won in the next three years his plan sees success.
The president-designate feels that it is the only way to sell the government’s stakes to privatize Woori Bank. Lee also said he will pay a special attention on the retirement fund market, which is expected to grow fast as the number of retirees is projected to expand rapidly in the near future.
Attracting retirement funds would also bring a large increase in the number of customers for Woori Bank, giving it a boost in the plan to increase the bank’s assets 15 trillion won annually. The bank’s annual profit would also rise to 1.5 trillion won from around 1 trillion won now, the president-designate told the personnel committee.
Lee also said he will focus on Woori Bank’s non-banking sector -- such as the sales of “bancassurance” and funds for increased non-interest income.
Lee has been well known for drawing up strategies and having a keen sense for business. When he was in charge of the Individual Customer Department, the number of Woori Bank’s customers rose to around 20 million.
He also has been known for close communication with staff, as he often adopted some of their ideas into his policies.
Lee is known for his steady push on strategies after they are officially adopted for implementation. Lee has also been given credit for the success of Woori V Card, which the bank introduced a number of years ago.
