Hyundai Motor Co chairman Chung Mong-koo returned to South Korea from a six-day business trip to the US, after prosecutors repeatedly called for his return to answer questions in an investigation into allegations of bribes for government favors.
"I am sorry to the public to have caused concern," the chairman of South Korea's largest auto-making business group said as he arrived at the Seoul airport at around 5am yesterday morning on a Korean Air Lines flight from Los Angeles.
The Supreme Public Prosecutors' Office has been calling for Chung's return since he left, prompting them on April 4 to prohibit his son, Kia Motors Corp president Chung Eui-sun, from traveling abroad.
Prosecutors are looking into dealings between Hyundai Motor, its affiliates and Kim Jae-rok, arrested on March 24 on charges of channeling funds to lobby government officials. Prosecutors say they are investigating whether the affiliates secured favors, including planning approvals for buildings and plant expansions.
Last month, they raided the offices of Hyundai, Kia and affiliated logistics company Glovis Co.
According to prosecutors, Glovi president Lee Ju-eun is in custody awaiting trial on charges of embezzlement, according to prosecutors. Hyundai Motor is South Korea's largest automaker and affiliate Kia is the second-biggest.
Regarding Kim, Chung Mong-koo yesterday said that he remembered "shaking hands with him in passing."
Chung was surrounded by about 200 Hyundai Motor employees and officials who scuffled with more than 100 reporters who had gathered at the airport to interview the business mogul.
"We won't take him in for questioning the moment he arrives," Chae Dong-wook, the chief prosecutor in the case, said on Friday. "We plan to decide on a date after discussing the matter with investigators."
A request for subpoenas for Chung and his son "to verify the use of funds by Hyundai Motor companies" is being considered by prosecutors, Chae said on April 6. They have yet to decide who to question first, he said on Friday.
LIMITED IMPACT: Investor confidence was likely sustained by its relatively small exposure to the Chinese market, as only less advanced chips are made in Nanjing Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC, 台積電) saw its stock price close steady yesterday in a sign that the loss of the validated end user (VEU) status for its Nanjing, China, fab should have a mild impact on the world’s biggest contract chipmaker financially and technologically. Media reports about the waiver loss sent TSMC down 1.29 percent during the early trading session yesterday, but the stock soon regained strength and ended at NT$1,160, unchanged from Tuesday. Investors’ confidence in TSMC was likely built on its relatively small exposure to the Chinese market, as Chinese customers contributed about 9 percent to TSMC’s revenue last
With this year’s Semicon Taiwan trade show set to kick off on Wednesday, market attention has turned to the mass production of advanced packaging technologies and capacity expansion in Taiwan and the US. With traditional scaling reaching physical limits, heterogeneous integration and packaging technologies have emerged as key solutions. Surging demand for artificial intelligence (AI), high-performance computing (HPC) and high-bandwidth memory (HBM) chips has put technologies such as chip-on-wafer-on-substrate (CoWoS), integrated fan-out (InFO), system on integrated chips (SoIC), 3D IC and fan-out panel-level packaging (FOPLP) at the center of semiconductor innovation, making them a major focus at this year’s trade show, according
DEBUT: The trade show is to feature 17 national pavilions, a new high for the event, including from Canada, Costa Rica, Lithuania, Sweden and Vietnam for the first time The Semicon Taiwan trade show, which opens on Wednesday, is expected to see a new high in the number of exhibitors and visitors from around the world, said its organizer, SEMI, which has described the annual event as the “Olympics of the semiconductor industry.” SEMI, which represents companies in the electronics manufacturing and design supply chain, and touts the annual exhibition as the most influential semiconductor trade show in the world, said more than 1,200 enterprises from 56 countries are to showcase their innovations across more than 4,100 booths, and that the event could attract 100,000 visitors. This year’s event features 17
Hon Hai Precision Industry Co (鴻海精密), which assembles servers for Nvidia Corp, yesterday said that revenue last month rose 10.61 percent year-on-year, driven by strong growth in cloud and networking products amid continued front-loading orders for artificial intelligence (AI) server racks. Consolidated revenue expanded to NT$606.51 billion (US$19.81 billion) last month from NT$548.31 billion a year earlier, marking the highest ever in August, the company said in a statement. On a monthly basis, revenue was down 1.2 percent from NT$613.86 billion. Hon Hai, which is also a major iPhone assembler, added that its electronic components division saw significant revenue growth last month, boosted
RSS