Lotte E&C President Ha Seok-ju gives a commemorative speech at a ceremony to celebrate the 60th anniversary at Jamsil Lotte Hotel on Sept. 6. (Photos: Lotte E&C)

The Lotte World Tower has proved that an excellent landmark structure can attract throngs of tourists, showing off its value as one of the key structures that Lotte E&C built as the renowned builder celebrated its 60th anniversary on Sept. 6.

Lotte E&C President Ha Seok-ju delivered a commemorative speech at a ceremony to celebrate the 60th anniversary at Jamsil Lotte Hotel on Sept. 6.

President Ha in his speech said we should remember that any activity taken by the company will help create better lives for our consumers, a clear reason for the company’s existence to continue for over a century as an enterprise respected by the society it serves.

 Various side-events were held besides the congratulatory speech by CEO Ha, his predecessors, the presentations of awards to mark the great occasion, awards for long-term employees, and awards for outstanding service for executives, as well as performances by a chorus made up of executives and staff, among others.

The history book on Lotte E&C, published on the occasion of the company’s 60th anniversary on Sept. 6.

The company published the book on its 60-year long history to commemorate various key events that occurred over the long span of time. The 123-story skyscraper, the nation’s tallest, is 555 meters tall. It was opened to the general public in April 2017.

It was the outcome of Lotte Honorary Chairman Shin Kyuk-ho’s tenacity and determination. It took six years and three months to build the most outstanding structure that Lotte E&C ever built in its 60-year long history. Lotte E&C employed an average of 3,500 workers daily on the project.

The structure used 50,000 tons of steel, equivalent to seven Eiffel Towers, the largest-ever single structure. The uppermost floors, 120 meters high, were constructed using the Diagrid engineering method, designed to endure its weight without pillars.

The Lotte Word Tower is the first structure in Korea to adopt the advanced engineering system. It is recorded as the highest structure in the world to do so.

This feat is owed to a combination of construction experience and technologies Lotte E&C accumulated for half a century.

Lotte E&C dedicated Lotte Center Hanoi, a 65-floor skyscraper, at 272 meters in height, in 2014, followed by the construction of the Lotte World Tower in Seoul, catapulting the Korean contractor to global stardom as one of Korea’s representative builders.

The Lotte World Tower was a long-standing goal that Honorary Chairman Shin had pushed for, said a Lotte E&C official, adding that it was kind of a “piece of artwork” crystallized with a combination of technologies Lotte E&C accumulated in diverse areas such as civil engineering, plant and house construction.

Lotte E&C is accelerating efforts to ramp up its capabilities to win orders in Korea and abroad by making the most of its sustainability management and differentiation core strengths.

Lotte E&C plans to supply about 19,000 apartment units in several parts of the nation, including, Seoul, Gwangmyeong, Gyeonggi-do, Cheonan, and Busan.

The contractor has released its differentiation apartment brands such as “Castle 3.0” and “Castle Smart” by implementing reconstruction and redevelopment projects to reinvent an old housing environment.

The Lotte Castle SKY-L65, an apartment-cum-store shop building near Cheongnyangni Railroad Station in Dongdaemun-gu, Seoul, which was put on the market this past July, was rated at the top of the apartment lottery market. Lotte E&C is stepping on the gas to explore the overseas housing construction market.

In May last year, Lotte E&C forged a strategic partnership on housing construction with Ho Chi Minh City-based major developer Novaland Group.

Earlier, the Korean contractor established a foothold in the Vietnamese housing construction market by setting up Lotte Land, an incorporated entity in Vietnam. The construction of the “Seoripol Tunnel,” a section connecting the Daebang Station on the Subway Line 7 and the Gangnam Station on the Subway Line 2 was done by Lotte E&C.

The contractor is aggressively involved in overseas civil engineering projects.

Lotte E&C aims to rise to an EPC global service provider specializing in design, procurement and construction surpassing simple plant projects.