An attendee uses the Samsung Pay app on a Samsung Galaxy smartphone to interact with SoftBank Group's Pepper humanoid robot during the second day of Mobile World Congress 2017 in Barcelona, Spain.
Chris Ratcliffe/Bloomberg
SSamsung Electronics, owned by South Korean billionaire Lee Jae-yong, plans to acquire additional shares in KOSDAQ-listed Rainbow Robotics for more than 267 billion won (about $180 million), becoming its largest shareholder, a move the tech group has made The latest move to solidify a foothold in an evolving market.
Samsung Electronics will increase its stake in Rainbow Robotics, based in Daejeon, south of Seoul, to 35% from 14.7%, the company said in a regulatory filing on Tuesday. The transaction is expected to close on February 17, subject to government approval. Samsung Electronics first acquired Rainbow Robotics in January 2023, acquiring a 10.22% stake for approximately 59 billion won.
The current largest shareholder is 70-year-old Wu Junhao, one of the co-founders of Rainbow Robot Company, holding 17.37% of the shares. If the transaction proceeds as planned, Oh's shareholding will be reduced to 7.78%. Oh's wife Yoon Hye-sun and their children Oh Soo-jung and Oh Soo-hyung (known as Erick in English) also own shares in the company with a market value of 3.16 trillion won.
Samsung Electronics said in a statement that after the transaction is completed, Rainbow Robotics will become a subsidiary of Samsung Electronics and its financial performance will be integrated into Samsung Electronics’ profits.
“This collaboration plans to accelerate the development of intelligent and advanced humanoid robots by combining Samsung Electronics' artificial intelligence and software technologies with Rainbow Robotics' robotics technologies,” Samsung Electronics said in a statement.
“Through this collaboration, Samsung plans to use Rainbow Robotics' collaborative robots, dual-arm mobile manipulators and autonomous mobile robots to perform manufacturing and logistics automation tasks,” Samsung Electronics added in a statement. “These robots can perform artificial intelligence calculations “
Rainbow Robotics was founded in 2011 by a team from the Humanoid Robot Research Center of the Korea Advanced Institute of Science and Technology, Korea's top technological university. The team developed South Korea's first bipedal walking robot in 2005, named Hubo.
Other large conglomerates in South Korea have been developing robotics businesses. Billionaire Euisun Chung's Hyundai Motor acquired a controlling stake in Boston Dynamics from SoftBank Group in 2009, valuing the maker of dog-shaped robots Approximately $1.1 billion. Most recently, in October, Boston Dynamics announced a partnership with Toyota Research Institute to develop humanoid robots powered by artificial intelligence.
Doosan Group, South Korea's oldest conglomerate with a history of 128 years, listed its collaborative robot unit Doosan Robotics last year. Doosan Robotics, South Korea's largest robot arm maker by sales, raised $312 million in the country's largest IPO of the year.
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