LS Group Chairman Koo Ja-yeol waves the group’s flag at the group’s

headquarters after taking the helm at the business group. 

LS Business Group, celebrating its 10th anniversary, is focusing on not only overcoming a crisis, but also building a solid foundation for future growth momentum under the stewardship of the newly-inaugurated Chairman Koo Ja-yeol.

The business group, separated from LG Group in 2003, has come from strength to strength by securing a foundation based on responsibility and transparency-oriented management despite the effects of the global financial crisis.

LS has an inherent DNA for overcoming crises that can be summed up as “placing a focus on the best faring fields and developing and exploring future growth engines in mainstream businesses.”

The group has seen its sales jump four fold, profits surge three fold and its corporate value balloon seven fold, compared to the period before the separation of the group, placing it 13th in rankings through M&As, diverse innovative activities, and globalized growth strategies in its mainstay fields of electric/electronics, materials, and energy.

As future core businesses, the group has nurtured the so-called green businesses such as the smart grid, renewable energy, core electric vehicle parts, and overseas resources development by expanding its existing business arenas. 

A case in focus is the rotational chairmanship among the cousins of the Koo clan, which has become the subject of a much talked about moving story in the business community.   

John Koo, who served as the first chairman of the group, now works as the chairman of LS Future Center, playing the ‘spiritual pillar’  of the group in manpower development, corporate culture innovation, enhancement of corporate value, and social contribution activities as well as support for overseas businesses through his accumulated global network, probably contributing to the new chairman’ s taking the helm at the group.  

The new Chairman Koo, in his inaugural speech, stressed “substantial growth to brace for a new era,” demonstrating his determination to not only overcome the crisis but to make this year the first year of the group’ s new leap forward by securing a strong capability to cope with any changes. 

He enumerated his top four management tenets for this year °™ revamping the group’ s management to overcome the effects of slow growth, constant exploration of new growth engines, expanding of global markets, and implementation of its social responsibility and roles °™ under the catchphrase ‘With a Challenging Spirit Afresh, Let’ s Unfold the Future Together.’ ”

The revamping of the group’ s management is designed to pursue substantial growth to overcome the effects of slow growth by building a sound management foundation based on a low-cost, high-efficiency production process and ramping up financial sustainability. The group will also continue to explore new growth engines, including green and solution businesses in the group’ s mainstay energy sector so that it can secure growth momentum that will dominate the future market in all categories including market, product, and service.

The group strives to strengthen its presence in the global market as it lets each group subsidiary secure global top-level competitiveness in its core and mainstay businesses. It tries to ramp up the conventional businesses’  standing while continuously exploring new markets in order to take the lead in the global market while pursuing transparent and fair management under its management tenet dubbed the “LSpartner-ship.”  

The group plans to have subsidiaries devoted to bringing about synergetic effects by sharing its three management approaches °™ green, solution, and partnership. The development of new technologies based on green and solution and the surfacing of newly emerging countries as major markets has shifted the industrial environment paradigm. 

LS does not rest on its laurels with the nation’ s top competitive edge in each of its business areas, and the group strives to secure a solid foundation in qualitative and quantitative terms by expanding its presence in foreign markets and continuing to explore related and new businesses.