Seoul - Samsung Electronics Company will this year freeze the salaries of all its workers in South Korea as the Galaxy smartphone maker battles slowing sales and plunging earnings.
The freeze is Samsung’s first in six years and is designed to strengthen competitiveness given business conditions are “not optimistic”, the Suwon, South Korea-based company said in a statement on Thursday.
Performance incentives and bonuses aren’t included in the freeze, the company said.
Earnings have slumped for three straight quarters as the South Korean company lost its outright lead in the global market and consumers switched to Apple’s new iPhones and cheaper Chinese handsets running on Google’s Android operating system.
Apple rose into a tie with Samsung as the world’s biggest smartphone marker last quarter, with both companies shipping 74.5 million units, Strategy Analytics said January 29.
Samsung has 99 556 employees in Korea as of September 30, according to a regulatory filing.
Bloomberg