“Spike in coronavirus cases disrupt Samsung, LG, Hyundai plants”, 1 March 2020

The novel coronavirus is disrupting the plants of Korea’s major conglomerates, as new confirmed cases reported one after another involve their employees.

… Samsung Electronics confirmed its third case of COVID-19 infection, of a worker at its smartphone plant in Gumi, North Gyeongsang Province.

… The assembly line where the employee worked is temporarily closed and expected to be fully functional early next week.

… a facility in Gumi was shut down for about three days as an employee of the smartphone division was confirmed with COVID-19. Six days later, one more employee of the firm’s network business division at the Gumi plant was also confirmed.

LG Display shut down its module plant… for three days after an employee of a bank on the campus of the Gumi plant was confirmed to be infected…

LG Innotek said… that its Gumi plant employee was confirmed to have been affected and its operation was suspended and shut down.

The Gumi industrial complex, home to leading Korean companies, including Samsung and LG, is nearby Daegu, in an area that has more than 70 percent of the confirmed COVID-19 cases in Korea.

Hyundai Motor’s Ulsan plant also found a confirmed case of COVID-19 infection… The automaker halted operations of the facility and identified the workplace, route and points of contact of the confirmed patient…

… Lotte Foods, SK Telecom and LS Group closed their respective headquarters in Seoul after employees there were found to have been infected…

Global companies are also restricting their employees from traveling to Korea in response to the spread of the new COVID-19 infection. Google has restricted its employees from traveling to Korea and Japan. Uber has limited its employees from traveling to Korea, Iran, Italy and China. Amazon went further, blocking its employees from moving even within the US.