Changing the world with innovations for the last 50 years

No one in South Korea or Lee Byung-Chul himself has ever thought that his small grocery store will one day become a multi-billion-dollar company which will change the history of innovation in the world. This little venture, now as we know as Samsung, has reshaped the world with its incredible innovation and technology.

Since November 1, 1938, the starting of the company, Samsung has expanded into various businesses including construction, insurance, retail business, and shipbuilding. After 32 years of its inception, Samsung produced its first-ever electronic product – 12-inch black and white television.

Driven by the simple but profound goal of creating meaningful innovation, Samsung has pushed the limits of mobile technology and set the standard for what the smartphone can and should be. Right from the beginning, the company saw the potential of turning the mobile phone into a multi-functional device. The release of TV phone in 1999 brought entertainment to the palm of our hands, while the built-in 10-megapixel camera on the Samsung B600 brought high-quality photography and the mobile phone together.

In 2002, Samsung launched the True Color Phone, introducing the world to the active matrix LCD display, and paving the way for the innovations in mobile display technology that are synonymous with the Galaxy series. Over the years the Galaxy series continued to break new ground, improving and expanding the smartphone experience with each new device. With its Galaxy Note series, Samsung introduced a new category of smartphones – the phablet – which has been widely copied by competitors. Currently, Samsung is the world’s largest manufacturer of mobile phones.

Ever since the original black and white TV, Samsung has been introducing cutting-edge technologies across its consumer electronics, home appliances, and mobile businesses. The company’s innovation process began with research conducted by multidisciplinary teams of designers, engineers, marketers, ethnographers, musicians, and writers, who searched for users’ unmet need and identify the cultural, technological, and economic trend.

Samsung has built an impressive record on design, garnering more awards than any other company in recent years. The bold design of its televisions often defies conventional style. Samsung has been the world’s number one TV manufacturer for 13 consecutive years now. The company’s market-leading journey began in 2006 when Samsung unveiled the Bordeaux TV with an LCD display.

Inspired from the round-shaped glasses, the Bordeaux laid the foundation for a new era of TV design. A couple of years later, Samsung launched the world’s first edge-lit TV, before introducing LED TVs in 2009, followed by a groundbreaking development of Smart TVs on 2011, where they enabled internet access on television. From then onwards, Samsung brought many other pioneering developments starting from first curved OLED to the latest QLED 8k TVs.

Let’s not forget, Samsung has also developed various home and kitchen appliances. The company’s ground-breaking and consumer-focused products have challenged the routines and stereotypes, by leading the market into delivering true innovations and convenience to its valued consumers. Samsung will maintain the market leadership position with premium, innovative products like the FamilyHub refrigerator featuring advanced voice recognition technology that is guaranteed to improve family communication, the FlexWash washing machine which can support two simultaneous or separate washes of different clothing capacities and fabric types, and the WindFree air conditioner for staying cool without direct wind.

Samsung Electronics rapid rise and technical achievements put the company in the spotlight in the semiconductor industry. Its 4-megabit chip, in fact, had made the company the leading global producer of DRAM (dynamic random-access memory) chips by early 1995. Currently, Samsung is the largest memory chip manufacturer in the world.

The innovation that Samsung has brought for the last 50 years has opened up the world to endless possibilities for consumers everywhere. The next chapter of electronics industry story will soon begin, and one thing can be said for sure: Samsung will continue to develop meaningful breakthrough designs to help you do more of what you love.