LS chairman emphasizes 'agile innovation'

Koo Ja-eun, incoming chairman of LS Group, speaks during the 2021 LS Agile Demo Day at LS Tower in Anyang, Gyeonggi Province, Dec. 16. Courtesy of LS Group

By Baek Byung-yeul

Koo Ja-eun, incoming chairman of LS Group, is calling on affiliated companies to pursue “agile innovation” so that the conglomerate can sharpen its global competitiveness.

The group held its annual LS Agile Demo Day event from Dec. 15 to Dec. 17. Since 2019, LS has held the Agile Demo Day event every year, sharing achievements made through agile innovation.

Agile innovation refers to the profitable application of creativity encompassing continued improvements based on flexibility and quick responses to feedback across all departments of a company. Such methods have revolutionized the global IT industry.

Under the theme of “Get Agile Right,” Koo told employees that the group's pursuit of agile innovation is to continuously create points that can be differentiated from other companies.

"In order for LS to grow and become a more competitive global company, we need to create 'additional differentiation' beyond existing differentiation we have compared to others," he said. "To this end, we need to be able to solve customers' complaints by conducting constant observation and experience."

This year's Agile Demo Day was characterized by not only sharing project cases of each affiliate, but also sharing organizational changes through agile innovation activities, LS said.

“There could be conflicts in the process of creating additional differentiation through agile innovation, but we can move to become a more mature organization by forming a 'culture of coexistence' through understanding and supporting each other between organizations that promote agile innovation and those that do not,” he added.

One of the successful examples of the group's agile innovation activities came from LS ELECTRIC's Tech Square platform that helps customers establish smart factory automation systems, the group said.

In November, LS Group board members appointed Koo as a next chairman of the family-owned conglomerate. Since its establishment in 2003, LS Group has maintained its tradition of cousins taking control of the group. With the decision, Koo will lead the group from January, 2022 to 2030.