KT Chairman Koo Hyun-mo's Flag Raising: "Abolishing Chairman Position" Reflected in Articles of Incorporation to Enhance KT's Value

KT Regular Shareholders' Meeting on the 30th... Incorporating 'Abolition of Chairman Position' in Articles of Incorporation
President Koo Hyun-mo: "Achieving Sustainable Growth in Finance, Distribution, Real Estate, Security, and Advertising"

[Asia Economy Reporter Koo Chae-eun] "We will maximize profits from core businesses and strengthen growth potential in future businesses to enhance KT's corporate value."

The era of KT CEO Koo Hyun-mo, who created the myth of an 'internal CEO' for the first time in 12 years, has begun. Mr. Koo, appointed as the new CEO on the 30th, said, "Over the past three months, I have met various stakeholders inside and outside the company and felt both expectations and concerns about KT," emphasizing, "We will leverage our accumulated digital capabilities to focus on finance, distribution, real estate, security, advertising, and more to achieve sustainable growth." He expressed his ambition to expand the base of 5G subscribers through customer-driven self-innovation and maintain the No.1 position in paid broadcasting such as IPTV. Furthermore, he plans to accelerate new non-telecom businesses such as media content.

◆ Koo Hyun-mo emphasizes relinquishing power and responsible management = On the morning of the same day, KT held its 38th regular shareholders' meeting at the KT Research and Development Center on Taebong-ro, Seocho-gu, Seoul, where the appointment of Koo Hyun-mo as CEO was approved. Accordingly, KT concluded the six-year Hwang Chang-gyu era and welcomed a new era under Koo's leadership.

At this shareholders' meeting, the agenda included amending the articles of incorporation to change the CEO title from 'Chairman' to 'President,' and approving the appointment of seven new directors out of a total of eleven, including three inside directors and eight outside directors. Notably, the removal of the 'Chairman' rank and the establishment of a 'CEO President' system in the articles of incorporation stood out. The KT chairman system was introduced by former Chairman Lee Seok-chae in 2009 and had been used for over ten years. This change reflects the KT board's opinion that the title of chairman is not suitable for KT, a national enterprise. The intention is to decentralize the powerful authority previously concentrated in the chairman and strengthen the checks and balances on the CEO.

The new inside directors include the CEO nominee Koo Hyun-mo, Park Yoon-young, head of the Corporate Division (President), and Park Jong-wook, head of the Management Planning Division (Vice President). The new outside director candidates are Kang Choong-gu, professor of Electrical and Electronic Engineering at Korea University; Park Chan-hee, professor of Business Administration at Chung-Ang University; Yeo Eun-jung, associate professor specializing in Finance at Chung-Ang University; and Pyoh Yeon-myung, former president of Lotte Rental.

[Image source=Yonhap News]

◆ Strengthening innovation in new businesses including AI alliance formation = Prior to the shareholders' meeting, on the 26th, CEO Koo demonstrated his commitment to responsible management by purchasing 5,234 shares of KT stock worth approximately 100 million KRW. Judging that KT's stock price was excessively undervalued, the CEO took the lead in 'defending the stock price' through this share purchase. The dividend for the 2019 fiscal year was finalized at 1,100 KRW per share and is scheduled to be paid starting April 22.

CEO Koo Hyun-mo is expected to concretize and execute the transformation into an artificial intelligence (AI) company within this year. In February, he took the first step by forming an 'AI One Team,' an AI alliance encompassing industry, academia, and research institutes. CEO Koo stated, "We are reviewing various measures to enhance corporate value and will do our best to make KT a leader in changing customers' lives and innovating other businesses."

Considering the spread of the novel coronavirus disease (COVID-19), the shareholders' meeting was conducted via electronic voting to strengthen shareholders' voting rights. Since 2006, KT has implemented a 'written voting system' allowing shareholders to remotely express their opinions on agenda items via mail sent to their addresses, and this system was fully applied to electronic voting as well. KT is also considering the introduction of electronic voting across all listed companies within the group. Meanwhile, KT's consolidated financial statements for last year were approved, reporting sales of 24.342 trillion KRW and operating profit of 1.151 trillion KRW.

This content was produced with the assistance of AI translation services.