Lotte (conglomerate)

26 February 2004

Lotte
롯데
ロッテ
Industry
  • food processing
  • retail
  • financial services
  • electronics
  • petro-chemicals

and more

Founder Shin Kyuk-ho
Headquarters Jung District, Seoul, South Korea
Area served
 Asia, North America, Europe
Key people
 Shin Kyuk-ho, Shin Dongbin
Revenue 67,418,470 million KRW (2011)[1]
5,626,487 million KRW (2011)[1]
3,289,570 million KRW (2011)[1]
Number of employees
 South Korea: 180000
Japan: 5000
Website www.lotte.co.kr
Lotte
Korean name
Hangul 롯데

Lotte Co., Ltd. (Hangul: 롯데, Katakana: ロッテ) is a Japanese conglomerate with headquarters in South Korea and Japan. Lotte was established in June 1948 in Tokyo, by Korean businessman Shin Kyuk-ho (Japanese alias: Takeo Shigemitsu). Shin expanded Lotte to his home country, South Korea with the establishment of Lotte Confectionery in Seoul on April 3, 1967. Lotte eventually grew to become South Korea's eighth largest business conglomerate.

Lotte Group consists of over 90 business units employing 60,000 people engaged in such diverse industries as candy manufacturing, beverages, hotels, fast food, retail, financial services, heavy chemicals, electronics, IT, construction, publishing, and entertainment. Lotte's major operations are overseen by Shin's family in South Korea and Japan, with additional businesses in China, Thailand, Malaysia, Indonesia, Vietnam, India, USA, UK, Russia, Philippines, Pakistan and Poland (Lotte bought Poland's largest candy company Wedel from Kraft Foods in June 2010). Today, Lotte is the largest confectionery manufacturer in South Korea, and is the third largest in Japan behind Meiji Seika and Ezaki Glico in terms of sales revenue when only the sales of Lotte's confectioneries are counted.

History

Lotte was founded in June 1948 in Tokyo, by Korean Businessman Shin Kyuk-ho, two years after he graduated from Waseda Jitsugyo High School (早稲田実業学校). Originally called Lotte Co., Ltd, the company has grown from selling chewing gum to children in post-war Japan to becoming a major multinational corporation.

Name

The source of the company's name is neither Korean nor Japanese, but German. Shigemitsu was impressed with Johann Wolfgang von Goethe's The Sorrows of Young Werther (1774) and named his newly founded company Lotte after the character Charlotte[2][3] in the novel ("Charlotte" is also the name of a new brand of deluxe movie theatres run by Lotte). Lotte's current marketing slogan in Japan is "The sweetheart of your mouth, Lotte" (お口の恋人,ロッテ, Okuchi no koibito, Rotte).

Management

Lotte Holdings Co., Ltd. – Lotte group's world headquarters – are located in Myeongdong, Seoul and Shinjuku, Tokyo. It is controlled by the founder Shin Kyuk-Ho's extended family.

Business

Lotte World in Seoul
Lotte Young Shopping Plaza in Daegu, South Korea
Song Seung-Jun, South Korean starting pitcher who plays for the Lotte Giants

Lotte group's major businesses are food products, shopping, finance, construction, amusement parks, hotels, trade, oil and sports.

Sports

Lotte also owns professional baseball teams

Lotte R&D Center

Corruption Scandal

In June 2016, companies of the group were raided by South Korean prosecutors, investigating into a possible slush fund as well as breach of trust involving transactions among the group's companies.[11] The investigation forced its Hotel Lotte unit to abandon an initial public offering and Lotte Chemical Corp to withdraw from bidding for Axiall Corp.[11] Its Vice Chairman, Lee In-won, was found dead in August same year. He was suspected of suicide just hours before being questioned by prosecutors.[11] Lee was considered the top lieutenant of Chairman Shin Dongbin.[11]

See also

References

  1. 1 2 3 Report 2011
  2. ↑ Lottehotel.com
  3. ↑ "Korean Chaebols: Lotte. The Origin of the Lotte Name". Retrieved 20 April 2014.
  4. ↑ Chevalier, Michel (2012). Luxury Brand Management. Singapore: John Wiley & Sons. ISBN 978-1-118-17176-9.
  5. ↑ Lotteshopping.com
  6. ↑ Lotteplaza.com
  7. ↑ Lotteintl.com
  8. ↑ HPC.co.kr
  9. ↑ KPchem.co.kr
  10. ↑ lotterentacar.net
  11. 1 2 3 4 Jin, Hyunjoo; Lee, Se Young (August 26, 2016). "Lotte vice chairman found dead amid probe; suicide suspected". Reuters. Retrieved 26 August 2016.
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