Leading the doubling of electric vehicle battery customers
"Important period for a 200 trillion won-worth order supply"
On the 1st of next month, after the extraordinary general meeting of shareholder
The CEO of LG Energy Solution was replaced abruptly. Vice Chairman of LG Corporation Young-soo Kwon was appointed the head of LG Energy Solution. LG Energy Solution held a board meeting on the afternoon of October 25th and announced the appointment of LG Corporation Vice Chairman Young-soo Kwon as the CEO. After the approval of the extraordinary general meeting scheduled for November 1nd the board of directors, Vice Chairman Kwon will begin his term as LG Energy Solution CEO and Vice Chairman. He will discontinue the tasks for LG Corporation.
Vice Chairman Kwon is a key figure in pioneering LG's electric vehicle battery business. In December 2011, LG Group merged the small battery business division and the medium and large-sized battery division and promoted it to the battery business headquarters. At that time, Vice Chairman Kwon took on the position as head of the battery business division. It has attracted orders from leading global automakers such as Audi and Daimler. Within two years of Kwon’s office, the number of electric vehicle battery customers has doubled to about 20. Based on the successful management performance, LG's medium- and large-sized batteries ranked top in the market.
LG Energy Solution stated, “This is an important time for the establishment of large-scale joint factories with leading global automakers such as Hyundai Motor, General Motors (GM) and Stellantis, and smooth supply of orders worth 200 trillion won. We decided to appoint Vice Chairman Kwon to a new leadership position as we saw an urgency to give trust to our customers and the market.” LG Energy Solution was spun off from LG Chem in December last year.CEO Jong-hyun Kim’s system was officially launched to preoccupy the global market as the electric vehicle market expanded. LG experienced growing pains in the process. Large and small issues continued to arise such as battery lawsuits with SK, recall of GM batteries, and delay of IPO plans.
It is interpreted that LG Group saw a need for new leadership in order to leap forward as a top-ranking global battery company. President Kim decided to retire. It is known that this decision reflects the will of Chairman Kwang-mo Koo. When LG Corporation President Kwang-mo Koo’s system was launched in June 2018, Vice Chairman Kwon was appointed as Chief Operating Officer (COO) of the holding company to assist Chairman Koo in July of that year. Since then, he has been assisting Chairman Koo by strengthening the competitiveness of its flagship businesses in the electronics, chemical and telecommunication sectors and strengthening LG business portfolio.
An LG official emphasized, "This decision is based on President Koo’s determination and will that as the battery business, the group’s core business, is rapidly growing, as a leading global company, we need to appoint the most reliable manager to preemptively prepare for the future while widening the gap with competitors such as China.”
By Staff Reporter Gun-il Yun (benyun@etnews.com)