Takeo Shigemitsu（Gyuk-Ho Shin）moved to Japan during the war and founded Lotte Co. in 1947. Lotte has developed into a general confectionery manufacturer in Japan. Two years after the normalization of diplomatic relations between Japan and Korea, he founded Lotte Confectionery in South Korea in 1967 and grew it into what is now the fifth largest “chaebol” in Korea. There were many first-generation Korean entrepreneurs living in Japan, like Shigemitsu who moved to Japan and started business activities. However, no entrepreneur like Shigemitsu had ever succeeded in both Japan and Korea. The reasons for this are the following four points.
First, Shigemitsu had the characteristics of the entrepreneur, which Schumpeter has mentioned, such as “innovation” and “creative destruction”, which Shigemitsu took to win the fierce gum competition without knowing anything. Second, was during the period when Shigemitsu was slow to enter the Korean market. I believe that Shigemitsu, who was calmly observing business management, was waiting for the timing to enter the Korean market. Third, it is the presence of Chang-Soon Yoo, who was appointed the chairman when Lotte Confectionery in Korea was established. For Shigemitsu, there were various problems in the process of founding Lotte Korea. Yoo’s presence was extremely valuable because he reduced the risk of such problems and supported Shigemitsu in various ways in the new market of Korea. And fourth, Lotte’s corporate development is different in both Japan and Korea. While Shigemitsu, consistently developed Lotte as a general confectionery manufacturer in Japan, the path to founding Lotte in Korea had a different start than Shigemitsu had originally envisioned since he there was come connections with Korean government. However, as mentioned above, although the business management was unplanned, one of the reasons for its success lies in Shigemitsu's unique characteristics that allowed Lotte to develop significantly.
