South Korean tech giant Samsung Electronics on Thursday said its third-quarter operating profits were down 31.39 percent year on year after a global economic downturn hit demand for consumer electronics.
Earnings in its crucial memory chips division dropped, the company said in a statement, adding that “demand for consumer products remained weak”.
Operating profit for July to September 2022 fell to 10 trillion won ($7 billion), down from 15.8 trillion won for the same period last year, the company said.
The results were released the same day the company announced de facto leader Lee Jae-yong—who received a presidential pardon in August over a fraud conviction—would be promoted to chairman of Samsung Electronics.
“Our survival depends on future technologies,” Lee said in a message posted on the company’s internal forum after his promotion, Yonhap reported. “We can turn this crisis into opportunity.”
The third-quarter results are the first year-on-year decline in profit in nearly three years for Samsung Electronics, the world’s biggest smartphone maker.
But the company said it had seen an increase in sales, which were up by 3.79 percent from…
