“The man who led Samsung Electronics Co. to the top of the TV and cellphone industries, Choi Gee-sung, stepped down as chief executive officer Thursday and will be succeeded by the head of the company’s component businesses,” Evan Ramstad and Jung-Ah Lee report for The Wall Street Journal,” Evan Ramstad and Jung-Ah Lee report for The Wall Street Journal.

MacDailyNews Take: He led Samsung to the top of unit share of the cellphone industry. By slavishly copying Apple, which tops the cellphone industry in profit share by a large margin.

“The CEO’s power, however, is being diminished as Samsung tries to create more separation—or at least the image of it—between its consumer and component businesses,” Ramstad and Lee report. “Samsung said the leaders of the consumer-product divisions, including TVs and phones, will not report to the new CEO, Kwon Oh-hyun, who has led Samsung’s chip business since 2008 and took control of its display-components business last year. Chairman Lee Kun-hee will play the decisive role when the component and consumer product sides of Samsung conflict. Amid a parade of CEOs, Mr. Lee has long been Samsung’s most important executive, wielding considerable influence even when taking a less active role in the company’s day-to-day work.”

“Samsung’s competing interests are frequently discussed in the company and industry circles. Its ability to balance them flared into the public eye last year when Apple Inc., the largest buyer of Samsung’s chips and displays, sued it for allegedly copying the designs of the iPhone and iPad,” Ramstad and Lee report. “In public documents and testimony, Apple has not tied Samsung’s structure to the alleged patent infringement of its products. Since the suit, Samsung executives have become increasingly vocal about the lines of division between its businesses and taken several steps to make those lines more visible. In December, the company appointed Mr. Kwon as co-vice chairman with Mr. Choi and reshaped its financial reporting into two segments, called Device Solutions for components and Digital Media & Communications for consumer products.”

MacDailyNews Take: If you get repeatedly mugged for at least half a decade by the exact same mugger, do you continually buy the leather for your new wallets from your mugger while attempting to press charges in order to finally get him to stop mugging you? If you’re Tim Cook, you do.

Ramstad and Lee report, “As CEO, Mr. Kwon will handle ‘corporate-wide affairs,’ Samsung said. He will likely play a greater role in matters such as the Apple litigation. Last month, Mr. Choi led Samsung in court-ordered settlement talks in one of the Apple cases in the U.S… Mr. Lee, the son of Samsung’s founder and South Korea’s richest man, has controlled the firm since his father’s death in 1987 with emperor-like power. His day-to-day activity has varied, but he has been increasingly visible since returning to the chairmanship in 2010 after a two-year absence prompted by a fraud investigation.”

Read more in the full article here.

Related article:
Headroom: Apple takes 75% of mobile phone profits with just 9% of units sold – March 22, 2012

Now Samsung slavishly copies Apple’s Mac mini – June 1, 2012
Samsung unveils Apple iTunes knock-off – May 29, 2012
Samsung’s S Voice, an Apple Siri clone, leaks; Samsung blocks rival iPhone clones from using – May 21, 2012
Samsung’s Tizen prototype has a familiar home button: Apple’s – May 8, 2012
Slavish copier Samsung shamelessly steals Apple’s iPhone 3G design – again – January 3, 2012
Now Samsung’s slavishly copying Apple’s iPad television ads (with videos) – December 30, 2011
Samsung debuts Apple iPod touch knockoff – November 6, 2011
Samsung is so not copying Apple, here’s proof – September 28, 2011
Oh Samsung, you are making this too easy – September 24, 2011
Why are Apple’s icons on the wall of Samsung’s store? – September 24, 2011
Samsung’s ‘Instinct’ is obviously to make Apple iPhone knockoffs – April 1, 2008