[THE INVESTOR] Samsung Electronics said on Nov. 16 that it has promoted a total of 221 junior executives, wrapping up the firm’s year-end reshuffle.

The latest round of promotions comes after the leadership shakeup, which replaced CEOs of the firm’s three pillar businesses for electronic components, home appliances, and smartphones, which was followed by the reshuffle among executive presidents and exeutive vice presidents. 

Of the 221 newly promoted executives, 99 belong to the electronic components unit, which made the largest contribution to its recent profit growth this year.

The company promoted 27 to executive vice president, 60 to senior vice president, and 118 to vice president posts.

In the R&D sector, one research ‘Fellow,’ a title given to top Samsung researchers, was newly appointed and 15 were named as ‘Master,’ for whom Samsung guarantees independent research projects and benefits given to those with an executive role.

The newly promoted at Samsung’s global offices include senior vice executives James Elliott and Dermot Ryan, who take charge of US memory marketing and semiconductor sales, respectively.

A total of seven female executives were promoted in the latest promotions -- three from the chip business unit, one from the mobile unit, two from the home appliance division, and one from the public relations team.

“The year-end promotions among the junior executives were delayed due to prolonged internal reviews,” an industry source said.

It was widely expected that the tech giant would carry out the reshuffle among lower-ranking executives and managers last week on the heels of several rounds of appointments and promotions earlier this month.

The promotions of the lower-ranking executives -- the largest in size since 2013 when the firm promoted 227 executives -- were conducted based on different factors including their work performance and employment period.

Those belonging to the semiconductor unit benefited the most in the executive promotion as the business unit played a significant role in posting record profits in the recent months -- Samsung’s operating profit came in at 14.5 trillion won (US$12.90 billion) in the third quarter and the components unit took up nearly 70 percent of the profit.

In May this year, the tech company promoted 96 executives in a reshuffle after skipping the annual shakeup last year due to the so-called Choi Soon-sil scandal, which led to the imprisonment of Samsung Vice Chairman Lee Jae-yong for bribery charges.

By Kim Young-won (wone0102@heraldcorp.com)