SEOUL, March 30: The president of Intel Corp resisted questions on Monday about whether his company planned to invest in South Korea's leading chip-maker.Craig Barrett came to Seoul to speak at a company seminar and give away some high-tech equipment, but spent much of his time fending off questions about possible investments in Samsung Electronics Co Ltd.
"Intel is having many discussions with local companies in Korea and around the world," Barrett said in a news conference.
"Those conversations are confidential until we have something to announce," he said.
Asked again about a possible investment by Intel in Samsung Electronics, Barrett responded: "Yes, we're interested in talking to Korean companies but right now all those conversation are confidential."
When a third reporter suggested that Barrett's responses indicated "something was going on" with Samsung, the Intel executive said: "If there's something going on, it's going on in a confidential fashion."
Barrett later met with South KoreanPresident Kim Dae-jung, who also raised the issue of an Intel investment.
Kim explained to Barrett the country's efforts to welcome foreign investors and asked Intel to show more interest in South Korea as an investment target, but Barrett made no promises, the presidential office said in a statement.
South Korean media have reported Intel and Samsung Electronics were discussing an investment by Intel of as much as $1 billion into the Korean firm. Various Samsung officials have suggested such discussions were under way.
Intel is the world's largest chip manufacturer while Samsung Electronics is the world's largest memory chip maker.
Low prices for DRAM or dynamic random access memory chips in recent years have slammed Samsung Electronics, which last week said its net profits for 1997 had fallen nearly 25 per cent to 123.5 billion won ($89 million).
Copyright © 1998 Indian Express Newspapers (Bombay) Ltd.
