Samsung Electronics Executive Chairman Lee Jae-yong joined other members of the Samsung Group's founding family to mark the fifth anniversary of former Chairman Lee Kun-hee's passing.
Samsung Group reported that Chairman Lee participated in the memorial service in Suwon, Gyeonggi Province, alongside his mother Hong Ra-hee, who serves as Honorary Director of the Leeum Museum of Art, his younger sister Lee Boo-jin, who leads Hotel Shilla as President, and another sister Lee Seo-hyun, who heads Samsung C&T as President.
The family was joined by approximately 150 current and past company leaders at the late chairman's burial site, including Samsung Electronics Vice Chairman Jun Young-hyun, Samsung C&T CEO Oh Se-chul, and Samsung Life Insurance CEO Hong Won-hak.
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Following the memorial service, Chairman Lee and the leadership of Samsung's subsidiary companies gathered for a lunch meeting in Yongin, Gyeonggi Province, to honor the memory of the former chairman.
The former chairman passed away on October 25, 2020, following more than six years of medical treatment after suffering a heart attack in 2014.
He assumed leadership of Samsung Group as its second chairman in 1987 and played a pivotal role in South Korea's economic development by converting Samsung from a manufacturer of inexpensive, poor-quality mobile devices into the nation's premier business conglomerate.
He is particularly remembered for his notable 1993 statement that the company needed to transform everything while keeping only their spouses and children unchanged. During Samsung's early period, mobile phone defect rates reached as high as 12 percent, leading him to make the dramatic decision in 1995 to incinerate approximately 150,000 Anycall mobile devices valued at 50 billion won ($34.76 million) to emphasize the importance of quality standards.
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He pursued bold investments in semiconductor technology, allowing Samsung to sustain its dominance as the leading global DRAM manufacturer for over three decades beginning in 1992. During his leadership, he stressed the significance of future preparedness, which enabled the conglomerate to weather major economic downturns including the 1997 Asian financial crisis and the 2009 worldwide economic recession.
In accordance with his belief in distributing prosperity gains, the Lee family has engaged in charitable giving and philanthropic endeavors. In 2021, they contributed 700 billion won toward enhancing the country's disease outbreak response capabilities and allocated 300 billion won for supporting pediatric cancer and rare disease treatments.
Additionally, over 23,000 artworks from the late chairman's personal collection were gifted to museums at national and regional levels. The Lee Kun-hee collection, containing 14 designated national treasures and 46 significant cultural artifacts, has been displayed at multiple venues including the National Museum of Korea and the National Museum of Modern and Contemporary Art, enhancing the nation's cultural legacy.
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Starting in November, the collection will be presented globally, beginning with the Smithsonian Museum in the United States, then moving to the Art Institute of Chicago and concluding at the British Museum.