Former Daewoo Group Chairman, Kim Woo-choong, once touted as one of the most successful businessmen in South Korea, died late Monday at age 82.
The Daewoosky Institute, an organisation for former employees and managers made the announcement on Tuesday on its website.
Kim had laid the foundation for his economic empire in 1967 with $5,000 and a small textile company.
He was sentenced to 10 years in prison in May 2006 for embezzlement, accounting fraud and other offences.
He had surrendered to the authorities after six years on the run.
In November 2006, an appeal court reduced the sentence to 8.5 years
As part of the special amnesty, Kim’s prison term was suspended in late 2006 because of his poor health and was pardoned at the end of 2007.
The history of the Daewoo Group and the entrepreneurial biography of its former boss are symbolic of the rapid economic rise of South Korea but also of its unrestrained expansion drive.
The group collapsed in the late 1990s under a debt of about $80 billion.
The country’s second-largest conglomerate at the time had more than 40 affiliates, ranging from cars, electrical goods and household appliances to ships.
The group was later broken up.