Jay Y. Lee

Lee Jae-yong, or Jay Y. Lee, is the executive chairman of Samsung Electronics and South Korea’s richest person. Lee had long been groomed for power and was raised, educated, and trained to take over from his father, Lee Kun-hee, at the company founded by his grandfather. Even while he was climbing the ranks at Samsung, Lee was often referred to as the “Samsung heir.” He had been operating as the group’s de facto leader since 2014, when his father fell into a coma after a heart attack. The company’s leadership was tarred by a bribery scandal in 2017, however, a case that was tied to the corruption scandal of South Korea’s former President Park Geun-Hye. Though Lee served detention and a stint in jail, he was granted a special presidential pardon in 2022 and returned to lead Samsung. Though it’s the top maker of memory chips worldwide, Samsung has fallen behind rivals in the hottest area of the market, supplying the kind of chips that Nvidia and AI pioneers are gobbling up. It has also given up ground to rival TSMC in terms of its foundry business, which supplies custom chips to outside customers. Though the stock has been punished this year, Samsung Electronics’ shares have doubled since 2017.