April 24, 2024

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[THE INVESTOR] US printer and PC giant HP has decided to set up a new office for research and development in Korea after its planned acquisition of Samsung Electronics' printer business division within the year.

HP COO Jon Flaxman and Gyeonggi Province Governor Nam Kyung-pil signed a memorandum of understanding on July 5 at the US company’s headquarters to locate the new office in the province, adjacent to Seoul. 

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HP plans to select the office site within the year and start the operation by 2019. The new office is expected to carry out diverse R&D for printer and other product production.

The latest deal comes after HP announced its plans to acquire Samsung’s printer business division for US$1.05 billion last year. Samsung spun off the unit, now called S-Printing Solution, early this year to be acquired by HP within the first half of the year.

S-Printing Solution owns a research base in Suwon, Gyeonggi Province, a production plant in China and some 50 sales operations, with some 6,000 people being hired globally. In 2015 its annual revenue reached 2 trillion won (US$1.75 billion).

HP says all the Korean operations and employees will be retained even after the acquisition. The company also plans to sell its inkjet printer products under the Samsung brand name in Korea.

Earlier, Samsung and HP agreed on a combined 110 billion won package as employee compensation, equivalent to 60 million won for each of the 1,800 employees here, as well as job security for five years. Sources said the two firms allegedly pay for half the costs.

By Lee Ji-yoon (jylee@heraldcorp.com)