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East Asia
Samsung posts record profit of W8.84 tril.
Samsung Electronics said Friday that its operating profit nearly doubled to a record high of 8.84 trillion won ($8.3 billion) for the fourth quarter of last year from a year earlier on the back of brisk smartphone sales. Its net profit jumped 75.6 percent to 7.04 trillion won during the…
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East Asia
We want to see more of you
We want to see more of our leader-to-be as Park Geun-hye has made herself scarce, minimizing public appearances. Keeping a low profile may help in some ways but doesn’t in others. As the President-elect said, it enables the incumbent government to finish their business without distraction. During previous changeovers, the…
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East Asia
Kakao Story creating lots of trouble for everyone
So Yeon, a member of girls vocal group Tiara, and her entertainer friends engaged in private conversation on Kakao Story, a mobile communications network, in which she berated some of the people she knew. That got her into hot water. A 27-year-old company worker went on a pleasure trip to…
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KT, LG to offer ‘unlimited’ LTE service
KT and LG Uplus announced Friday that they will offer “unlimited” data services for customers signing up for new pricing packages supporting speedier telecommunication networks called Long-Term Evolution (LTE). The move was designed to attract more customers as top local carrier SK Telecom will be banned from signing new customers…
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East Asia
Women rise at foreign drugmakers
The imaginary glass ceiling seems omnipresent for Korean women, who struggle to advance their corporate careers in a country that data shows has the highest level of workplace gender division among rich economies. For female employees frustrated by the pace of advancement, branches of foreign pharmaceutical companies here may feel…
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East Asia
When Dreams Come True: Reflections on ‘Social Economy’ in Korea
*Author, Won-soon Park is a prominent civil rights lawyer, civic activist and social innovator. He became Mayor of Seoul in October 2011. First there was triumph of market economies after the fall of the Soviet Union. Then came successive global financial crises that debunked that triumphalism. Now, a new concept…
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East Asia
Japanese Court Guard Ship Uses Water Cannon To Prevent A Taiwanese Fishing Boat From Approaching A Disputed Island
In this photo released by Japan Coast Guard 11th Regional Headquarters, a Japan Coast Guard patrol boat uses water cannon to warn a Taiwan’s leisure boat, left, and Taiwan Coast Guard boat off Uotsuri in Japanese and Diaoyu Dao in Chinese, the biggest island in the disputed Senkaku or Diaoyu…
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East Asia
Kim Yong-joon, Former Constitutional Court Chief, Meets The Press Upon Being Nominated As PM Of Incoming Gov.t
Kim Yong-joon, a former Constitutional Court chief, speaks during a press conference in Seoul, South Korea, Thursday, Jan. 24, 2013. Kim Thursday was nominated by President-elect Park Geun-hye as the first prime minister of her incoming government. <AP Photo/Ahn Young-joon> South Korea’s President-elect Park Geun-hye (Front) arrives at the transition…
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East Asia
U.S. Envoy On NK Affairs Speaks To Reporters After Meeting With His South Korean Counterpart In Seoul
U.S. envoy to North Korea Glyn Davies, right, speaks after meeting with South Korea’s nuclear envoy Lim Sung-nam at the Foreign Ministry in Seoul, South Korea, Thursday, Jan. 24, 2013. The North Korean military commission led by leader Kim Jong Un warned Thursday that the regime is poised to conduct…
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East Asia
Small firms need to overcome Peter Pan Syndrome
Small Korean firms are trapped in what resembles the Peter Pan Syndrome or Dwarf Syndrome, where adults do not want or feel unprepared to grow up. In the Korean economy, this tendency can be seen among small- and medium-sized firms that fear to become large companies. Since the 1980s, the…
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