SONY

DESCRIPTION
All eyes are on Sony -- or, more likely, on its high-profit PlayStation home video game systems. PlayStation 2 dominates the game console market with about 70% of global sales (Nintendo's GameCube and Microsoft's Xbox control about 15% each). Sony, one of the world's top consumer electronics firms, also makes a host of other products, including PCs, digital cameras, Walkman stereos, and semiconductors; these products account for more than 60% of the company's sales. Sony's entertainment assets include recorded music and video (Epic and Columbia), motion pictures (Sony Pictures Entertainment, Sony Pictures Classics), DVDs (Sony Pictures Home Entertainment), and TV programming (Columbia TriStar).RETURN

SAMSUNG

DESCRIPTION
Although it's selling off assets and cutting costs, Samsung Corporation isn't singing a swan song, it's just trying to become more efficient. The trading arm of the Samsung Group, one of Korea's top chaebol (industrial conglomerates), Samsung Corporation has more than 80 branch offices worldwide. The company trades in a range of businesses, including oil and gas, semiconductors, heavy machinery, steel, chemicals, and textiles. Its construction division, which helped build the Petronas Twin Towers in Malaysia -- the world's tallest buildings -- handles civil projects, plant construction, and architectural design. Samsung's housing development unit builds condominiums and apartments.