Samsung's journey toward design excellence started in 1993. That year, Lee reportedly visited an electronics store in Los Angeles, USA. He noticed, to his dismay, that the Samsung products on display looked unattractive, while the products of Sony and some other companies looked much more appealing.

He found too that the sales personnel at the store were themselves ignoring the Samsung products. Lee realized that Samsung was paying too much attention to volumes and the cost of production, while ignoring customer value. He recognized that in order to survive, Samsung would have to make high quality, exciting products.

Samsung redesigned its systems and processes to improve the design delivery process. First, the company modified its product creation process. Samsung earlier was an engineering-driven company and there was very little interaction between the company's engineers, marketers, and designers. The designers only took orders from engineers and product planners. However, this arrangement was done away with, and designers began to enjoy as much, if not more, authority as engineers and marketers. Collaboration between different departments became a key aspect of new product development...