Samsung appoints new CEO as it battles Apple for supremacy

Samsung Electronics reshuffled some of its top team on Thursday as it battles Apple for supremacy in smartphones and leads the charge to new chip technology.

The South Korean group, valued at close to $165 billion, named Kwon Oh-hyun as its new chief executive. Currently head of Samsung's components business, which oversees chips and display, Kwon will succeed Choi Gee-sung, who is moving to a new role as head of group corporate strategy to focus on future growth engines.

Jay Lee, son of Samsung Electronics' chairman Lee Kun-hee and the group's heir apparent, remains as chief operating officer, Samsung said.

Choi had been CEO since January 2010.

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Samsung, which said earlier this month that sales of its range of Galaxy smartphones had topped 50 million, has moved quickly to overtake Apple in the fast-growth mobile market and has blown away Nokia and BlackBerry maker Research In Motion.

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It also dominates the global memory chip market and is moving into non-memory, or logic chips, which make mobile devices work rather than just store data.

Samsung earlier said it will spend $1.9 billion on a new logic chip line to make processors for mobile devices amid explosive demand for smartphones and tablets.

Samsung, which makes application processors for Apple's iPhone and iPad - which rival its own Galaxy and Note devices - said the new line will use 300 mm wafers and 20 nanometer and 14 nanometer processing technology.

Demand for system chips used in smartphones and tablets is set to more than double to $59 billion in 2016 from $23 billion last year, according to research firm Gartner.

Ahead of the announcements, shares in Asia's biggest technology firm closed up 5.2 percent in a broad market rally that sent the benchmark KOSPI index .KS11 up 2.6 percent.

Reuters