Half of the CEOs of South Korea’s top 500 companies are in their 60s. Over the past three years, there has been a decrease in the number of representatives in their 30s and 50s, while the number of representatives in their 60s and 80s has increased. Meanwhile, the percentage of female representatives has remained steady at around 2 percent.
CEO Score, a Korean business data research firm, released a study on Jan. 10 examining the ages of CEOs at the top 500 Korean companies. The study found that the average age of 670 CEOs at the beginning of this year was 59.7 years, 1.1 years older than at the end of 2020 when the average age was 58.6 years.
At the end of 2020, the largest proportion of CEOs were in their 50s, accounting for 50.6 percent (337 CEOs). However, over the past three years, there has been a significant increase in the proportion of CEOs in their 60s, rising from 35.9 percent (239 CEOs) to 49.0 percent (328 CEOs). Concurrently, the proportion of CEOs in their 50s has decreased to 38.5 percent, totaling 258.
During the same period, the percentage of CEOs in their 40s declined from 7.2 to 6.7 percent (48 to 45 CEOs), and those in their 30s from 0.9 to 0.3 percent (6 to 2 CEOs). In contrast, the percentage of CEOs in their 70s increased slightly from 4.2 to 4.3 percent (28 to 29 CEOs), and those in their 80s from 0.9 to 1 percent (6 to 7 CEOs).
The youngest CEO among the top 500 Korean companies is Nathan Chuang of AIA, who was born in 1988 (age 36). The oldest is Lee Sang-eun, born in 1933 and 91 years old, CEO of Das and older brother to former South Korean President Lee Myung-bak.
There are 16 female CEOs, about 2.4 percent of the total, in these top 500 companies. This number marks a slight increase from the end of 2020 when there were 13 female CEOs.
