1. SAMSUNG Electronics Company :
Global Marketing Operations
Presented by
Mithisar Basumatary

2. SAMSUNG
THE FASTEST GROWING KOREAN
BRAND
FOUNDER: LEE BYUNG CHUL
CURRENT CEO: CHI HUN CHOI (2014 ONWARDS)
CURRENT CHAIRMAN: LEE KUN HEE
SUBSIDIARIES: SAMSUNG ELECTRONICS LTD., SAMSUNG HEAVY
INDUSTRIES, SAMSUNG C&T CORPORATON , SAMSUNG SDS.

4. Introduction
• INDUSTRY: CONGLOMERATE
• FOUNDED: FOUNDED 1ST MARCH, 1938
• HEADQUARTER: SEOUL, S. KOREA
• AREA SERVED :WORLDWIDE
• REVENUE :US$ 305 BILLION (2014)
• NET INCOME: US$ 22.1 BILLION (2014)
• TOTAL ASSETS :US$ 529.5 BILLION (2014)
• TOTAL EQUITY :US$ 231.2 BILLION (2014)
• NUMBER OF EMPLOYEES:489,000 (2014)

5. INTRODUCTION-PROFILE
• 1938: Produced agricultural products.
• 1969: Founded Samsung Electronics Company.
• 1970: Acquired semiconductor business.
• 1970s: Focussed on shipbuilding, chemicals &
textiles.
• 1980s: Launched home appliances.
• 2003: Introduced TFT-LCDs for TVs & Montors.

6. QUESTIONS OF THE CASE
1. Financial crisis occurs in Asian market in 1997
proved negative net profit of 3% with only SEC
sales were $16 billion. HOW SAMSUNG
RESPONDED?
2. RESULTS
3. MARKETING STRATEGIES IN ITS GLOBAL
MARKET
4. RECOMMENDATIONS AGAINST ITS
COMPETITORS.

7. WHAT SAMSUNG DID IMMEDIATELY?
1. 1997: Dismissed 29,000 employees globally
2. 1998: Sold $2 Bn worth of its capital assets
3. 1999-2003: Instead of outsourcing its production to
external houses, it manufactured in its own
competence
4. 1998-2003: Invested $19 Bn in chip factories
2.8 5.9
28
44.6
0
20
40
60
1999 2002
SALES AND PROFIT
SALES
NET PROFIT
IN Bn

8. 5. Digital Product Innovation with investment of $2.45
Bn annually, involving 17,000 scientists, engineers and
designers
6. Employed CDMA in its devices: Code Diversification
Multiple Access
7. Digital Convergence: i.e. merging of different
technologies into one major product. Introduced SPH-
i-700 Camera Phone and Palm OS-based smart phone
by 2003 end.

9. THE MARKETING ORGANISATION
• Eric Kim headed the Global Marketing Operations
(GMO) unit in 1999.
• GMO coordinated Samsung’s overseas business and
watched its marketing operations.
• GMO has the following team:
1. Marketing strategy team
2. Regional strategy team
3. Product strategy team
1. GMO funds were only use for advertising and other brand franchising activities.
2. GMO funded 70% of its fund in fashion and 30% on other opportunities.
3. Invested $400 Mn in 2003

10. 4 P-STRATEGIES OF SAMSUNG
1. PRODUCT
2. PRICING
3. PROMOTION
4. PLACING

11. MARKET
DOMESTIC INTERNATIONAL

12. 1. PRODUCT STRATEGY
I. In 1970, Samsung made cheap 12 inch
television sets under Sanyo label.
II. High investment in research and technology.
III. In 2005 Samsung spent about 9% of revenue,
amounting to $5 billion.
IV. In 2002, it introduced coloured screen phones
in US
V. It was the first company to manufacture 57
inch LCD screens

13. 2. PRICING STRATEGY-
I. Competitive pricing: Samsung Elec. used this
policy for products like TVs, ACs, Refrigerators
against the models of LG and Panasonic.
II. Between 1998 and 2003, it invested $19
Billion for manufacturing chips, like NAND,
etc.
III. In 2003, it invested $17 Billion in TFT-LCDs
1. Skimming pricing strategy was used by Samsung Electronics for smart phones.
2. It didn’t consider vertical integration and investment in manufacturing, and R&D not as Fixed
Costs, but rather flexible.

14. 3. PROMOTIONAL STRATEGY:
I. Product Placements.
II. Sponsorships, eg Sydney Olympics 2000, 2002
Winter Olympics in Salt Lake City, 2004 Summer
Games, Athens, 2006 Winter Games, Torino, 2008
Summer Games, Beijing.
I. Media Advertising.
II. Internet Advertising.

15. POMOTIONAL STRATEGY:
Positioning is the act of designing the company’s
offering and image to occupy a distinctive place in
the minds of target market.
I. The Korean Company changed its logo, by
symbolizing the world moving through space and
writing “Samsung” in English to reach global
market.
II. By partnering , it targeted customers looking for
prestige, quality and wealth.

16. 4. PLACING STRATEGY
I. EUROPE: Samsung was stronger in the southern
countries of the Europe like Spain, Italy. In North,
people were loyal to German brands. They explored
B2B opportunities in the enterprise space.
II. ASIA: Asian markets include Russia, China, India
and South-East Asia. They launched in Russia with
their market needs in late 1980s. Chinese market
estimated 5 Mn customers in 2002 with telephone
services. It opened its manufacturing plant in China
and R&D in India in 2003.
EXHIBIT: Results indicated that Samsung brand was at different degrees of development in
different countries.

17. III. US electronics market was popular with Sony. So
Samsung partnered with chains like Walmart, Target,
Best Buy, and Circuit City, etc as the top 10 chains
accounted 60% of electronic sales.
70%
15%
8%
7%
ELECTRONICS MARKET SHARE 2002
S. KOREA
AMERICA
EUROPE
ASIA

18. DOMESTIC
• SAMSUNG had over 50% of the market share
in South Korea (70% in 2002).
• Being a mountainous state, S. Korea proved a
good market for wireless services. So it
invested huge fortune on wireless
technologies, Chip-sets, etc.

19. Result
• By 2002 Samsung recorded net profit of $5.9
billion.
• Samsung’s sales grew by 51% as against 4% of
Motorola and Nokia’s at less than 4% in 2002
• Ranked in 25th position in world’s most valuable
brands in 2002 (34th position in 1997)
• Fastest growing brand in the top 100 valuable
brands

20. Results

21. Results

24. M-NET recommendations
1. SEC was overspending about 45% of its current
budget in N. America and Russia as they did not
have high market potential. So 35% should have
been done!
2. Europe and China had huge market potential. But
only 31% was invested. 42% should be done!
3. Again it was investing more on mobile phones,
vacuum cleaners, ACs, and NOT on DVD players, TV,
PCs or refrigerators.

25. OUR RECOMMENDATIONS FOR 2002
1. Like Sony’s PlayStation, Samsung should build
gaming appliances.
2. Samsung should tap the youth market, like
Sony and Nokia,
3. Samsung should develop proprietary
software like Sony, on music, movies, etc.
4. Like Nokia and Motorola, Samsung should
invest on low-end cell phones also.