Chung Yong-jin returns as E-mart CEO as Shinsegae reshuffles top leadership

Shinsegae Group on Friday named Chairman Chung Yong-jin as a registered director of E-mart and reshuffled the top leadership of major affiliates including E-mart, SSG.com and Shinsegae Caasa. The move reaffirmed Chung's commitment to hands-on management. The department store division led by Shinsegae Co. Chairman Chung Yu-kyung, by contrast, kept its chief executives in place and focused on organizational stability while promoting younger executives.

According to the regular executive reshuffle Shinsegae Group announced Friday, Chung will return to E-mart's board of directors and serve concurrently as representative director of both E-mart and Shinsegae Property. His formal appointment as E-mart CEO is subject to shareholder approval at a future general meeting. Chung plans to establish a co-CEO structure at E-mart and Shinsegae Property, personally steering the group's mid- to long-term strategy and cascading its vision across affiliates.

The group is pushing to evolve beyond its core retail business into a comprehensive lifestyle, content and entertainment conglomerate, making Chung's direct leadership critical. It is already pursuing partnerships in AI with Reflection AI, in real estate development with Aman Group, and in content with Skydance. "Chairman Chung has determined that he must exercise direct leadership to drive the group's transformation during this era of industrial upheaval centered on AI," Shinsegae Group said.

E-mart, Shinsegae Caasa, Shinsegae International and the Shinsegae baseball club will all see their CEOs replaced. Kim Hong-geuk, the outgoing CEO of Shinsegae Caasa, has been named E-mart's new co-CEO. Kim has earned wide internal respect for his risk management acumen. Heo Min-ho, a specialist in specialty retail, has been brought in as the new CEO of Shinsegae Caasa. Shinsegae International will be split into separate fashion and cosmetics divisions, each with its own dedicated management — Kim Deok-ju, the current Shinsegae International CEO, will head the fashion side, while Heo will concurrently oversee cosmetics. Ki In-ju, CEO of SMPMC, has been named to lead the Shinsegae baseball club as it prepares for the opening of the Cheongna dome stadium.

The group's management strategy office, which serves as its control tower, will be filled with new faces. Choi Taek-won, the outgoing SSG.com CEO, has been appointed head of management support, overseeing personnel and audit functions across the group. Park Seung-hak, head of leisure operations at Josun Hotel & Resorts, has been named head of external affairs, responsible for public relations and government relations. Jeon Sang-jin, executive vice president and head of management at the strategy office, was retained.

Shinsegae Group described the reshuffle as a measure that balances stability and change. The 36 newly promoted executives represent the largest such class in the group's history. Executives in their 40s were actively elevated, with that age group now accounting for 18 percent of all group executives, also a record high. Shinsegae said it plans to follow up the reshuffle with rolling personnel moves to place the right people in the right roles, continuing its organizational overhaul and embedding an innovation culture throughout the group.

Work on the formal separation of the two business divisions has also picked up pace. The E-mart division led by Chung Yong-jin established an independent management structure when it was spun off from Shinsegae Co. in 2011. In 2024, the group officially announced plans to pursue a full separation of the E-mart and Shinsegae divisions, and last year Honorary Chairwoman Lee Myung-hee transferred her stakes in both divisions to Chung Yong-jin and Chung Yu-kyung, respectively. The remaining task is to unwind the cross-shareholdings in affiliates jointly held by both divisions.

SSG.com, a prime example, is scheduled to undergo a spin-off in December, splitting into a surviving entity focused on grocery delivery and a newly established company called Shinsegae Mall centered on fashion and beauty. E-mart spent 827.5 billion won ($625 million) in August to acquire the stake held by financial investors, lifting its ownership to 65.1 percent against Shinsegae's 34.9 percent. However, under the Fair Trade Act, a family-member separation requires cross-held stakes in unlisted affiliates to be reduced below a certain threshold, meaning further unwinding is still needed.

In this reshuffle, Shinsegae Group named Kim Hong-geuk — E-mart's incoming co-CEO — to also head SSG.com. The plan is to strengthen online and offline competitiveness simultaneously and unlock synergies between E-mart and SSG.com in earnest.

The Shinsegae Co. division led by Chung Yu-kyung took a comparatively quiet approach to the reshuffle. Park Ju-hyung, CEO of Shinsegae Co., Lee Seok-gu, CEO of Shinsegae DF, and Kim Young-seop, CEO of Shinsegae Simon, were all retained. Kim Nak-hyeon, store manager of Shinsegae Department Store's Centum City branch — which has posted annual sales exceeding 2 trillion won for three consecutive years — was promoted to executive vice president.

The strategy appears to prioritize securing a solid earnings base through organizational stability rather than management turnover, given that earnings at the department store and other key affiliates improved sharply following last year's personnel overhaul. Shinsegae Co.'s consolidated operating profit surged 75.5 percent year-on-year in the first half of this year to a record 365 billion won. Shinsegae International and Shinsegae DF both returned to profitability.