The immediate impact of Steve Jobs’ departure from Apple is uncertain, but over the longer term, Korea’s corporate sector ― along with the rest of the world ― will surely feel the absence of the legendary IT visionary, industry watchers here said. “Jobs is a man who had a distinct vision and who created a system built to endure so there probably will not be any changes in the short-term such as ...

Four out of five workers in Korea feel exhausted when they return to work after summer vacation, a poll showed on Thursday. According to Job Korea, a local online job search engine, about 77.8 percent of 457 respondents said that they are suffering from lingering fatigue from summer holidays. Of those who are still stressed, 72.9 percent said they have “lost morale to work and feel listless,” w...

By Lee Ji-yoon Caff Bene, a Korean coffee house chain, received the best reviews in a recent consumer survey, while other local coffee retailers also scored high compared to international rivals. Korea Consumer Agency and KAIST Center for Fair Trade and Consumer Protection announced Wednesday the result of a recent survey on 1,020 consumers who have visited six coffee retailers here. Caff Bene...

By Kim Ji-hyun Samsung Electronics is expected to roll out a tablet PC running on a Microsoft operating system at a global electronics trade show scheduled to open in Germany next month, industry sources said on Wednesday. The new tablet is reportedly the brainchild of the company’s IT solution business. Samsung’s existing Galaxy Tab tablets had been in the realm of the mobile business unit led...

By Lee Ji-yoon Homeplus, a local supermarket chain, said Wednesday it will open a “virtual store” in a subway station in southern Seoul so that customers can buy products without visiting an outlet. The virtual store will start operation from Thursday at Seonreung Station in Yeoksam-dong. According to the No. 2 discount store chain, smartphone owners can buy products by waving their mobile pho...

By Choi He-suk POSCO began mass producing steel plates coated using ultraviolet rays on Wednesday, becoming the world’s first steelmaker to use the method on commercial scale. Named POSCOTE-UV, short for POSCO smart coating technology-ultraviolet, is more resistant to scratches and its surface is brighter and more reflective than conventional steel plates, the company said. The company said th...

Korea’s information technology industry is facing crisis after enjoying a top spot for about 20 years with the government only stressing hardware and thinking less of software. Following recent mergers of global firms, such as Google’s acquisition of Motorola and Hewlett-Packard’s takeover of Autonomy, a government official told reporters Monday that the government will form a consortium with lo...

Companies with greater global exposure lost almost W130tr The stock value of local conglomerates took a nosedive this month, with the total market capitalization of the nation’s top four companies shedding 128.8 trillion won ($11.8 billion). The decline over the past 15 days was an average 22.8 percent, a worse performance than the benchmark KOSPI, which fell 19.6 percent in the same period, th...

South Korean electronics behemoth Samsung Electronics Co. is suffering a decline in sales of its 3-D TVs in China due to increased competition, an industry report showed Tuesday. According to the report by market research firm DisplaySearch, Samsung Electronics accounted for 9.3 percent of the 3-D TV market in China in the second quarter of the year, compared with 18.3 percent the previous quart...