[THE INVESTOR] Naver was picked as the top performing firm among the country’s major 500 companies, data by industry tracker CEO Score showed on May 23.

Korea’s No. 1 internet portal operator received top remarks in a business evaluation that centered on eight areas, including earnings, investment, job creation and transparency.

While Naver stood as the No. 1 company in terms of social contributions, it also received healthy evaluations in other major areas, including global competitiveness.

CJ Cheiljedang, Korea’s leading food manufacturer, came in second on the back of its devotion to achieving gender equality at its workplace.

Samsung Electronics boasted sound competitiveness and transparency, but its major restructuring of workers last year had an adverse impact on its overall evaluation, dropping the company to the third spot.

By Alex Lee and newswires (alexlee@heraldcorp.com)