The Samsung Sandwich
March 29, 2021
The Korean giant pumped billions of dollars into China and came to dominate its smartphone market. Now, it’s closing factories. What happened? By Geoffrey CainThe
The Korean giant pumped billions of dollars into China and came to dominate its smartphone market. Now, it’s closing factories. What happened? By Geoffrey CainThe
If corporations are people, as the Supreme Court ruled in 2010’s Citizens Uniteddecision, it’s only natural that they should have biographies. Forthcoming narratives about businesses new and old offer a window onto each company’s history as well as the social and economic contexts out of which they arose and which they in turn have influenced.
By Daniel Lefferts
Publishers Weekly
Nov 29, 2019
The Korean version of this essay appeared in the Kyunghyang Shinmun on 12 February 2015. The English version here has been published with the permission of the newspaper and the author.
By Geoffrey Cain
Kyunghyang Shinmun
Mar 31, 2015
SEOUL, South Korea — In a trendy Gangnam high-rise, a whiz-kid professor named Lee Sihan urges his classroom of 28 students not to fret. The big exam you’ve been preparing for — the one that could land you a Samsung dream job — won’t be that bad if you put the hours in.
By Geoffrey Cain
USA TODAY
Jan 26, 2015
SEOUL — Jiyeong Kim, 25, embodies the pinnacle of female ambition in South Korea. She dreams of making it to the top, and dedicates all of her free time to achieving her goals.
By Geoffrey Cain
PRI’s The World
Jul 23, 2013
SEOUL, South Korea — A crowd of young women wait nervously in the lobby of a popular plastic surgery clinic in Apgujeong, the affluent neighborhood at the heart of Gangnam. Photographs of Korean pop singers and actresses line the walls, winsome customers who smile next to their cosmetic surgeons.
By Geoffrey Cain
PRI’s The World
Feb 26, 2013
Vietnamese officials are stepping up repression of old and new media even as they promote an image of an open, globalized economy. Intense surveillance and imprisonment of critical journalists, coupled with increasingly restrictive laws, are choking the flow of information.
By Shawn W. Crispin
CPJ
Sep 19, 2012
What to read next:
Geoffrey Cain on Investigative Journalism, Authoritarian Power, and The Perfect Police State | In a wide-ranging conversation with Jennifer Grossman, CEO of The Atlas Society, investigative journalist Geoffrey Cain reflects on years spent reporting inside some of the world’s most restrictive regimes — and on the research behind his book The Perfect Police State: An Undercover Odyssey into China’s Terrifying Surveillance Dystopia of the Future.
For years, Tim Cook insisted Apple could change China from the inside. Instead, China changed Apple.
The latest evidence? Apple spent billions developing cutting-edge electric vehicle battery technology with Chinese automaker BYD, only to watch its innovations become the cornerstone of BYD’s rise to global electric vehicle dominance. Apple walked away with nothing. China walked away with everything.
This isn’t just another story about corporate research and development gone wrong. It’s a cautionary tale about how even America’s most valuable company has become trapped in China’s web of technological control — and how that web is about to tighten even further.