SAMSUNG CHINA TV MARKET
Samsung China: The Introduction of Color TV
Background
Samsung as a company was founded in 1938 in Korea. 46,500 employees are working at six Samsung Electronics facilities in Korea. Although they are at different locations, all share the same goal and that goal is satisfying global customers by producing a quality product. Here in the U.S. Samsung is a very recognized brand, sitting along side Sony, Panasonic, Phillips, Toshiba, Matsushita and other more know brands of TVs. In South Korea, Samsung was a governmentally subsidized large business until in the 1990's. In the mid 1990's one of the most significant threats to Korean corporations was that their major advantage in low labor cost had been deteriorating against the labor costs in many of the competing Southeast Asian countries. The average wage of $1,144 a month that Korean workers earned was one of the highest wages paid in Asia outside of Japan. Korea had been the low cost labor supplier until the point at which The Peoples' Republic of China entered the competition for manufacturing of color TVs. The low cost of labor in China would cause Korea's position being the lowest cost provider to be a position that was in danger. The Korean government at this point was discontinuing subsidies and export credits to Korean manufacturers and at this time the Korean products which had been the low end market
Strategic Planning
In 1995, production of color TV sets in China was starting to hit a high volume. It was estimated that 16 million sets were produced, including two million that were exported to Europe, North A ...