Forget Apple, Samsung Is Suing Itself !


Bangalore: Samsung Group, the South Korean conglomerate, is facing lawsuits not only from Apple and other competitors, but from its inside too. The feud over family fortune is now extending from court battles to outside, as descendants of Lee Byung-chull, the Founder of Samsung who died in 1987, is holding separate memorial services for him, first time in 25 years.

The branches of Lee family are engaged in furious legal battle over the years for billions of dollars worth shares in the company. Samsung Electronics Chairman Lee Kun-hee, the third son of Lee, who inherited majority of his father’s wealth is facing lawsuits filed by elder brother Lee Maeng-hee and elder sister Lee Sook-hee, who are demanding the return of a share of the legacy from their father, who died in 1987. Lee Jay-Hyun, the eldest grandson of Lee who inherited the CJ Group, which officially separated from Samsung in 1997, had also sued the Samsung Electronics chairman demanding for 100 billion won in cash and stocks.

But Lee-Kun-hee is determined to fight back saying that the accuser was “kicked” out of the family and that he had not observed the family rites. The Samsung Electronics chairman says that his relatives, including his elder brother Lee Maeng-hee, “have become covetous as Samsung has emerged as a global industrial behemoth.”

According to the latest statement from CJ group, the Samsung foundation which oversees the yearly family tribute to Lee, where family usually gathers at the 19 November ceremony, has informed CJ Group chairman that he and his immediate family “will not be able to use the front door” to the burial site when going to pay their respects. “Samsung’s notification to ‘come and go by the back door’ is tantamount to blocking the normal ancestral rites of other siblings and their descendants,” said CJ Group in the statement.

According to the replay statement from Samsung group, the feuding family groups will be holding separate memorial services, and said the path it had asked to be used was the one used every year by Samsung Group leaders coming to pay their respects.

Meanwhile, amidst the law suits from inside and outside, the Samsung Group chairman Lee Kun-hee is preparing Jay Y. Lee, his only son to take over the leadership.