Samsung Electronics 2Q Profit Declines

Employees of Samsung Electronics Co. sit under a formative arts made with Samsung logos at its headquarters in Seoul, Friday, July 13, 2007. Samsung Electronics Co. said Friday that second-quarter net profit fell 5 percent, amid price declines for its mainstay computer memory chips.(AP Photo/Ahnn Young-joon) (Ahn Young-joon - AP)

Besides memory chips, Samsung is also the world's top producer by market share of flat-screen televisions in both liquid crystal and plasma display versions. It ranks third globally in mobile phone handsets, and also produces other consumer electronics such as MP3 players and laptop computers.

Samsung recorded sales of 16.63 trillion won ($18.2 billion) compared with 14.1 trillion won a year earlier.

Samsung released earnings on the heels of a report that Icahn may be planning a hostile takeover bid. The report in the Chosun Ilbo, South Korea's largest newspaper, Friday cited an unnamed high-ranking official at Samsung.

In response to the report, a company executive said that Samsung has strategies to combat hostile takeover bids, although it's not aware of the existence of any such activity.

"This company is not aware of such an attempt," Executive Vice President Chu told the conference call in response to a question about the report.

"Should someone try to do something like that we have appropriate sets of strategy in place that we will implement that would be effective against those attempts," Chu said, without elaborating.

Hostile takeover attempts by foreign investors in South Korea are rare. Icahn and other U.S. investors were involved last year in an unsuccessful takeover bid for South Korean tobacco company KT&G Corp.

Any attempt to take control of Samsung, the country's most prized cooperate icon and a symbol of the country's emergence as an industrial economy, would likely be met with fierce resistance.

Samsung Electronics is South Korea's most valuable company with a market capitalization of 101 trillion won ($110 billion) as of the close of trading Friday, according to the Korea Exchange. Foreign investors owned 49.26 percent of its shares at the end of Thursday's session, the most recent data available.

Samsung shares have risen 12 percent this year.