by REERA YOO
Facebook’s CEO Mark Zuckerberg paid a visit to Samsung’s headquarters in Seoul on Tuesday, said Samsung officials.
According to Yonhap, Zuckerberg is believed to have met with Samsung’s heir-apparent Lee Jay-yong in an apparent bid to discuss new business models for both companies. The two were reportedly joined by Facebook COO Sherly Sandberg and Samsung’s mobile chief Shin Jong-kyun.
This is the third meeting between the two tech leaders this year, as their last meeting was only three months ago at the Allen & Co. Conference in Idaho, U.S.
Industry sources are now speculating that the purpose of Tuesday’s meeting was to discuss the final details of a new Facebook exclusive phone.
Samsung recently suffered an almost 60 percent drop in their third-quarter earnings due to stiff competition with Chinese smartphone makers such as Xiamoi and Huawei. Many industry professionals believe that Samsung is strengthening its partnership with Facebook in order to find new sources of profit while Facebook continues to search for a reliable business partner in hardware. A “win-win” meeting for both companies, according to tech sources.
Earlier this year, Samsung collaborated with Oculus, a Facebook-owned virtual reality tech company, in creating the virtual headset Gear VR.
Photo courtesy of Tekarticles
