Solid-Optis Consortium is maintaining part of domestic business even after buying Pantech due to strong desire from Pantech’s executives and staffs and maintaining technical skills. However its revival will come from foreign market as it was planned.
Solid-Optis Consortium is planning to maintain part of Pantech’s domestic business even after buying Pantech and starting business in Indonesia. As a meeting for related people had been postponed till next month, it plans to put detailed plan into its business plan during remaining time.
Because of this, Consortium is discussing with courts, investors, creditors, and Pantech about its plan to take over part of production facility in Kimpo Factory and about 20 AS centers in South Korea. As additional investment and operation fund are needed for domestic business, it needs plenty of time to discuss and this is why the meeting for related people had been postponed.
Consortium is planning to develop a new model with competitiveness rather than staying with outdated model. It is brought up that outside business will be in charge of production as Kimpo Factory was not a subject of being bought out, and Consortium will decide on price and types of products thereafter.
Industry is predicting that there is a high chance that Pantech will open its domestic business by putting out medium to low-priced phones with high performance compared to price. When Pantech reduced factory price of ‘Vega Iron 2’ and ‘Popup Note’ to $250 to $333 (300,000 KRW to 400,000 KRW), they were sold real fast. This kind of technical skills and potentials are still left in Pantech.
Fact that medium to low-priced phones are being sold more and more after mobile communication’s mobile terminal distribution act was issued can act as an advantage for Pantech. In South Korean Smartphone market that is being dominated by Samsung and Apple, mobile communication business can use Pantech as a way to keep them under control. As a result, it is predicted that particular mobile communication business’s exclusive phone will be released.
A reason why Consortium drew the strands by maintaining domestic business is due to strong desire from Pantech employees. Consortium accommodated their desires to manufacture and sell phones that South Korean customers want and it believes that cooperating with South Korean mobile communication business with world’s best technologies will help Consortium with technical skills and maintaining quality.
If it maintains part of domestic business, effect of inducing employment in related cooperative companies will occur. This means that employment effect as well as additional buying of Pantech’s manpower will grow bigger, and court and creditors also believe this to will bring a positive effect. However Consortium stressed that focal point of Pantech’s revival will come from foreign market.
“Even though we are doing business in South Korea, it does not mean that we will look for Pantech’s success in South Korea. We can find successful models in foreign countries as well.” said CEO Jung Joon of Solid.
Consortium is discussing with Indonesia’s state-communication business called Telcom Indonesia about establishing joint corporation. This proposal will have Pantech in charge of developing products and joint corporation in charge of manufacturing and sales and this proposal is similar to that of Apple’s business model. This consortium’s idea matches with Indonesia’s policy basis and calculation about breaking itself from depending on imports in Smartphone field where demand is increasing continuously.
“Although it is very advantageous for us to cooperate with mobile communication business in Indonesia, there are still many things that we have to prepare for due to fierce competition. Our goal is to expand our business to IoT, wearables, and others by using Pantech’s Intellecual Properties and communication technologies as basis in long-term.” said CEO Jung.
Staff Reporter An, Hochun | hcan@etnews.com