The South Korean group Samsung Electronics, world leader in cell phones and memory cards, announced Thursday a 7.3% increase in net profit in the second quarter.
Thanks to strong demand in the chip business that offset the negative impact of the coronavirus outbreak on cellphone sales, net profit stood at $ 4.66 billion from April to June ( 5.560 billion won).
“The spread of Covid-19 has resulted in closures and downturns in business in stores and production sites around the world but the company has risen to the challenge with its vast global supply chain,” says the group in a press release.
The impact of the pandemic has also been limited thanks to “the strengthening of online sales channels and cost optimization”, he adds.
Samsung Electronics is of crucial importance to Seoul, as the Samsung group is by far the largest South Korean family conglomerate, or “chaebol”, whose various industrial activities represent a significant part of the world’s 12th largest economy.
Samsung’s global turnover thus represents one fifth of the country’s gross domestic product (GDP).
South Korea, which in February was the second country most affected by the epidemic after China, had succeeded in controlling the situation through a very extensive strategy of testing and tracing the contacts of those infected.
But the country has recently faced an upsurge in cases of the novel coronavirus and last week recorded its highest toll in nearly four months, with dozens of imported cases.
The repercussions of the pandemic in the rest of the world have not spared South Korea’s highly export-oriented economy.
They plunged 13.6% in the second quarter compared to the second quarter of 2019, the strongest decline since 1974.
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