A senior manager from one of the world’s leading data storage business firms said Tuesday that demand for hard disk drives would continue to rise despite increasing demand for smaller, faster solid-state drives. In the current digital age when every minute, 30 hours of video are posted on YouTube; 100,000 are Twitter; 6 million posted on Facebook; and 20 million photos are uploaded to Flickr, according to leading data storage firm Western Digital Corp, the importance of storage technology cannot

Industry July 16, 2013

Hyundai Motor Group said Monday the company and its affiliate Kia Motors won five Red Dot Design awards, international design awards given to applaud innovative designs, in four categories. The mother company grabbed awards in three categories ― “Event Design,” “TV, Film, Cinema and Animation” and “Corporate Films” for the outstanding designs of a display hall named “Vision Hall” at one of its training centers, and video arts being displayed at the hall titled “Who am we?” and “Mobius Loop.”Kia

Industry July 15, 2013

LG Chem said Monday it would start supplying lithium-ion battery packs this month for Germany-based SMA Solar Technology, currently the world’s biggest solar inverter producer. The battery packs will be used in an energy storage system called Sunny Boy Smart Energy developed by SMA for household use. As the world’s first wall-mounted storage system, the inverter and battery pack have been combined for maximum space and energy efficiency, LG Chem said. The inverter, co-developed after years of re

Industry July 14, 2013

More than half of Samsung customers said that they would continue to choose the same brand rather than a competitor, while only less than a fourth of Apple customers said they would do so, a report showed.Securing the top spot three times in a row since last year in a report called Technology Brand Preference Index, Samsung marked a record rating of 58.7 and also became the only company out of 20 tech firms that scored over the 50-threshhold.The index, released by market research institute Strat

Industry July 14, 2013

Dongbu HiTek, a Seoul-based semiconductor maker, said Thursday that it started mass production of 2-megapixel CMOS image sensors for Chinese smartphone manufacturer BYD Microelectronics.As the demand for smartphone components has increased recently with more mobile phones being equipped with the 2-megapixel image sensor on the front, it is expected that shipments of the sensors will likely double this year compared to last year, the Korean firm said in a press release. The smartphone sensor is u

Industry July 11, 2013

Now that the fiercely competitive high-end smartphone market is well saturated, Samsung Electronics is pushing into the mid-range mobile phone market with plans to roll out stripped-down smartphone models.According to the IT Testing and Certification Laboratory, the state-run testing and certification agency for electronic devices, Samsung’s Galaxy S4 Mini (SHV-370D) has acquired certification for it to be sold unlocked, meaning that the phone will not be tied to a certain mobile network so that

Industry July 10, 2013

Amid expectation on the rise for Samsung Electronics’ smart watch, the world’s largest electronics firm filed a patent on its smart watch last week in Korea and the United States, The Korea Herald has confirmed.The world’s largest electronics firm applied for the patent on the wearable gadget it calls “Samsung Gear” on June 21 at the Korean Intellectual Property Office, and filed at the United States Patent and Trademark Office on June 27.It is said the name for the watch will be the official on

Industry July 4, 2013

Apple’s iPhone users in Korea were found to be less loyal to the smartphone than its rival’s followers, according to a report released Wednesday.According to a consumer report by DIGIECO or KT Economics and Management Research Institute, 53 percent of 416 survey respondents using an iPhone said they would not continue using Apple’s smartphone line. The result is based on the survey conducted on 3,763 smartphone users aged 13 to 69.For Samsung Electronics’ Galaxy S smartphone line, 35 percent of

Industry July 3, 2013

A troupe of Samsung Group in charge of finding new business sectors, launched three years ago, has been dissolved for allegedly failing to produce tangible results. All executives and high-ranking officials mobilized to the task force team Tuesday were confirmed to have returned to the group’s affiliates where they previously worked.“The team was disbanded as of July 1 as it had fulfilled its duties in laying the groundwork for five new projects,” a Samsung official said. “The projects have been

Industry July 2, 2013

Hackers claiming to be from hacktivist group “Anonymous” once again wracked the nation by launching fresh cyber attacks against 10 government agencies, local dailies and private firms on Monday, less than a week after similar attacks on the websites of Cheong Wa Dae, the presidential residence, government offices and political parties.The websites of local newspapers Yeongnam Ilbo and Gyeongnam Ilbo; Cyber Dokdo, a government-run promotion website for the easternmost islets of Dokdo; and the con

Technology July 1, 2013