The Fair Trade Commission said Monday it is looking into whether Homeplus broke the law with an allegedly misleading advertisement for discount LED monitors sold at its stores last week.Homeplus, the country’s No. 2 retail chain, was offering the LED monitors for as low as 199,000 won ($178.56) at its 122 stores nationwide. Some buyers, however, were angry to discover that the monitors were not eq

IndustryMarch 28, 2011

The state-run Korea Trade-Investment Promotion Agency said Monday that it will start assisting local firm’ overseas marketing through online social media. The trade body’s latest move comes as the world’s e-commerce market has been growing rapidly in recent years to reach a size of $9 trillion as of last year, KOTRA said.KOTRA will promote local information technology companies through social netw

IndustryMarch 28, 2011

Samsung LED Co. on Monday said that it has agreed with Japan’s Sumitomo Chemical Co. to form a joint venture to produce sapphire wafers that are necessary components of light-emitting diode, a semiconductor light source.The LED manufacturer said the 50-50 venture will be capitalized at 80 billion won ($72 million), with production of sapphire ingots and wafers scheduled to begin early next year.Th

IndustryMarch 28, 2011

Sony Ericsson on Monday said it will be releasing its new smartphone, “Xperia Arc” in South Korea next month through SK Telecom. South Korea will be the second nation to see the launch of Xperia Arc, following the firm’s home turf of Japan.“We want Xperia Arc to be known not only for its design, but as a phone defining new smartphone standards,” said Han Youn-hee, head of the firm’s South Korean m

IndustryMarch 28, 2011

Porsche SE, the sports-car maker that plans to merge with Volkswagen AG, will start 5 billion euros ($7 billion) share sale March 30 to reduce debt. The carmaker’s supervisory and executive boards signed off on the plan to sell shares at 38 euros apiece to current owners, Stuttgart, Germany-based Porsche said in a statement late Sunday. One existing share carries the right to subscribe to 0.75 new

IndustryMarch 28, 2011

Tokyo Electric Power Co. President Masataka Shimizu is facing calls to quit after the crisis at the utility’s Fukushima Dai-Ichi nuclear plant capped a tenure that has seen $26 billion wiped off the company’s market value. The share price decline since Shimizu took charge in June 2008 at Tepco, as the company is known, has deepened to 67 percent in the aftermath of the nuclear disaster, as of the

IndustryMarch 28, 2011

China Petroleum & Chemical Corp., Asia’s biggest refiner, will cut costs and accelerate its expansion overseas as government controls prevent the company from passing on higher crude-oil prices to customers.Profit rose 14 percent to a record 71.8 billion yuan ($11 billion) last year, the company known as Sinopec said Sunday. Net income missed analysts’ estimates and trailed Cnooc Ltd.’s 85 percent

IndustryMarch 28, 2011

surcharge on flights from China to Europe, excluding Russia and Turkey, to 1,000 yuan from 950 yuan per passenger, the official Xinhua News Agency reported. The increase is effective from April 1, according to the report.Hong Kong Dragon Airlines Ltd. raised its fuel surcharge from April 1 for flights from China to Hong Kong to $24.90 per passenger, Xinhua reported, without saying what the previou

IndustryMarch 28, 2011

Wal-Mart Stores Inc., the world’s largest retailer, is resuming normal operations at half the stores hampered by Japan’s strongest earthquake as residents struggle to find water, food and other necessities. A dozen of Wal-Mart’s Seiyu stores in the quake-hit Sendai area are restarting full operations Monday after being limited mostly to relief efforts for two weeks, Scott Price, Wal-Mart’s Asia ch

IndustryMarch 28, 2011

LG Display Co., the world's second-largest maker of liquid crystal display (LCD) panels, said Monday that it has decided to accept an apology from a Samsung executive who insulted LG engineers in a public event.The company said it has received a letter of apology from Kim Hyun-sik, vice president of Samsung's visual display business, regretting his use of a swear word to insult engineers at the ri

TechnologyMarch 28, 2011

   CHICAGO (AP) -- Add ``Facebook depression'' to potential harms linked with social media, an influential doctors' group warns, referring to a condition it says may affect troubled teens who obsess over the online site.   Researchers disagree on whether it's simply an extension of depression some kids feel in other circumstances, or a distinct condition linked with using the online site.   But th

TechnologyMarch 28, 2011

NEW YORK (AP) -- Here's some good news in the wake of Japan's isaster: A new study says big earthquakes don't set off other dangerous ones around the globe.Big quakes do trigger local aftershocks, but researchers found no sign of setting off moderate-sized events beyond about 600 miles (1,000 kilometers) away.That won't surprise most experts, said lead study author Tom Parsons. But it's different from his prior research, which did find a global effect for setting off small quakes, said Parsons,

TechnologyMarch 28, 2011

Japanese investors have been putting their money into the South Korean financial market even after Japan's devastating quake, data showed Monday, easing speculation that they may repatriate overseas assets to finance Japan's post-quake rehabilitation.The 9.0-magnitude earthquake and ensuing tsunami hit the northeastern part of Japan on March 11, leaving more than 20,000 people dead or injured.Japa

March 28, 2011