Hanjin founder seized opportunities with good sense of timing
Hanjin workers unload supplies for U.S. military forces at Quy Nhon, Vietnam, in 1968. Hanjin Group founder Cho Choong-hoon signed a $7.9 million contract to unload military supplies. / Courtesy of Hanjin Group
By Kim Jae-won
Hanjin Group founder Cho Choong-hoon had an excellent sense of timing to seize business opportunities ahead of his rivals.
The late entrepreneur moved quickly to find new business opportunities based on his experience in marketplaces. Sometimes, it was risky to set course under unfamiliar circumstances, but he took the first step earlier than competitors, with the confidence it was the right time to do business.
One interesting story is as follows.
In 1966, Cho signed a $7.9 million contract with the U.S. Forces during the Vietnam War to unload military supplies at the port of Quy Nohn. It was more than 100 times the amount he had received for his first contract with the U.S. Army in Korea a decade earlier.
Lee Im-gwang, a journalist who wrote a biography on Cho titled “Business as an Art,” attributed the success to his business instinct for perfect timing.
“Upon seeing the port of Quy Nohn from the sky, his business instinct told him an excellent opportunity awaited him there,” wrote Lee in the book published October. “That intuition and the trust that he had built over the years had worked together with perfect timing.”
Wartime Vietnam provided many opportunities for businesspeople, but not everyone was able to take advantage of the situation. Cho achieved remarkable results because of his good timing and he staked everything on it.
His sense of timing shined once again when Korean Air, an airline affiliate of Hanjin, bought 12 planes from Boeing. Cho’s staff objected to the idea, but he pushed for the project, expecting the price of aircraft to rise soon after.
And it happened as he predicted. The deal helped Boeing pull itself out of a bad slump and gave a boost to the economy in Seattle. Other companies that had been delaying their purchases started returning to Boeing one by one. A few months later, aircraft prices rose sharply.
“Not only had Korean Air purchased the aircraft at a low price by acting early, it had also formed close ties with Boeing,” wrote Lee. “Cho’s instinct proved far superior to the expert analysis in the company’s report.”
His sense of timing also worked in times of tragedy.
On Oct. 9, 1983, Cho called Korean Air’s Hong Kong office to prepare 17 coffins made of aluminum by midnight with no explanation. The manager asked around the city and finally found a manufacturer, but he could not supply all of them in time.
The Korean Air staff persuaded him to contact other suppliers and finally he managed to obtain the coffins and get them to the Hong Kong airport just before midnight. A specially chartered Korean Air flight arrived and carried the coffins to Myanmar.
They were for the victims of the Rangoon bombing which killed 17 South Korean delegates who were visiting the country. The incident was plotted by North Korean terrorists.
Thanks to Cho’s timely preparation, the government could successfully return the victims to their homeland. And the reason that he asked the coffins to be made of aluminum was that wooden coffins could not protect the bodies from decomposition in hot and humid weather.