Samsung names Kyung-Ah Kim as first non-founder woman CEO

Kyung-Ah Kim has been named the first non-founder female chief executive officer (CEO) of a Samsung group firm in the South Korean conglomerate’s over eight-decade-old history.

Samsung Bioepis Co. Ltd on Wednesday said Kim, who has been serving as executive vice-president and development division leader, has been named president and CEO at the Samsung group firm.

Kim will succeed Christopher Hansung Ko, who will lead the Samsung Future Business Division.

A veteran scientist with more than 20 years of experience in biologic development, Kim has been serving as development division leader since December 2021, overseeing all of Samsung Bioepis’ product development cycle across various therapeutic areas.

Since joining Samsung Bioepis in December 2015, she has been serving various leadership posts within the division.

Prior to joining Samsung Bioepis, Kim worked as principal scientist and later as vice-president at Samsung Advanced Institute of Technology (SAIT) leading Biotherapeutics Group focusing on development of antibody therapeutics targeting oncology.

Before joining SAIT, she worked as a scientist/head of cell biology at multiple biopharmaceutical companies, leading various projects on development of therapeutic agents, including genetic sequencing and profiling, development of drug screening assays, and pre-clinical assessment.

Kim holds a Ph.D, in neurotoxicology from The Johns Hopkins University, where she established signal transduction pathway, specifically in the learning impairment caused by genetic perturbation in lead poisoning.