Sung-Joo Kim

Chief Visionary & Sustainability Officer /
Chairperson of MCM Group

Sungjoo Group was founded in 1990 and has earned a reputation as Korea’s fashion leader having launched the prominent brands including Gucci, Yves Saint Laurent, Sonia Rykiel and Marks & Spencer.
In 2005, Sungjoo Group acquired MCM, a German luxury fashion brand founded in Munich in 1976.

Ms. Kim was selected as a Global Leader of Tomorrow by the World Economic Forum in Davos in 1997 and received the Ethics in Business Award from the EU government in 2009. In 2012, she was listed in Forbes’ Top 50 Asian Business Women, selected as one of Asia’s 25 Hottest CEOs by Fortune and invited by the United Nations be part of “Innovation 101” at the Decide Now Act summit.

She was awarded an Honorary Officer of the Order of the British Empire (OBE) by Queen Elizabeth II in June 2015 for her contribution to strengthening bilateral ties between the United Kingdom and the Republic of Korea. She holds three honorary doctorate degrees, from Amherst College (Mass., USA), Business School Lausanne (Chavannes, Switzerland) and University of the Arts London (London, UK). From 2014, she served as the President of the Korean Red Cross for three years.

Ms. Kim became the first female entrepreneur to be appointed as a member of ABAC, representing the Korean business community at APEC (Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation) in 2013. She served in this post until June 2017. Ms. Kim was appointed as a Member of the Advisory Board of the Fashion Council Germany in December 2017.

Ms. Kim is a passionate philanthropist and works with several non-profit organizations, including World Vision, Asia House as a trustee member, the Global Summit of Women as an International Planning Committee member, and numerous other humanitarian initiatives.