Lotte Group Rewrites CEO Playbook, Prioritizing AI Expertise Over Insider-Outsider Divide

Lotte Group is redefining how it selects chief executives across its affiliates, moving past the long-standing debate over whether to promote a homegrown "Lotte Man" or bring in an outsider. In its place, a new "mission-based" standard has emerged that matches leaders to the concrete problems their specific business unit must solve, regardless of where they came from.

The trend is most visible in recent appointments tied to AI transformation, or AX, which Chairman Shin Dong-bin has named the group's top strategic priority. In March, Korea Seven named Kim Dae-il, who built his career at AT Kearney, Bain & Company, Naver's global division, and most recently as head of SPC Group's IT and marketing affiliate, as its new chief. His mandate combines restoring convenience-store competitiveness with accelerating digital innovation. The same month, Lotte Members tapped Park Jong-nam, who previously oversaw the group's AI and digital transformation efforts across its global business, strategic planning and R&D units, to modernize the integrated membership platform and expand data-driven business across affiliates.

The pattern deepened further with Lotte Hi-mart's recent leadership change. The retailer picked Kim Jong-yoon, a veteran of Google, McKinsey & Company and travel-tech firm Yanolja, where he built AI- and data-driven operating systems and cloud SaaS models. His task at Hi-mart is to drive AI-based retail innovation and pivot the business toward customer-centric growth.

The shift traces back to 2021, when Shin first broke with Lotte's promotion-from-within tradition by recruiting Kim Sang-hyun, a former DFI Retail chief, to lead the group's Distribution HQ, alongside Ahn Se-jin from Coupang for the Hotel division and Jung Joon-ho from Shinsegae for Lotte Department Store. That HQ structure was dissolved late last year in favor of stronger affiliate-level accountability, a change that further tilted CEO selection toward "role fit" over pedigree.

Analysts link the accelerating pace of AX-focused appointments to Lotte's prolonged earnings slump and ongoing business restructuring across its retail, hotel and chemical units. Shin has personally led AI training sessions for more than 50 affiliate CEOs, reportedly telling them that AX is "not a matter of growth, but of survival," and pushing executives to present concrete AI strategies before company-wide rollout.

The technology push is already visible on the ground: Lotte On runs a "Fashion AI" recommendation engine, Lotte Mart uses deep-learning systems to manage fresh-food quality by delivery route, and Lotte Department Store offers real-time AI interpretation for foreign shoppers. Lotte Wemart, Lotte Chilsung Beverage and Lotte Hi-mart have each linked services to ChatGPT for product recommendations and membership access, while Lotte Innovate has built an in-house AI platform and tested a humanoid service robot at futuristic Seven Eleven stores and Lotte World Tower events.

Some observers caution that installing AI-savvy CEOs alone will not guarantee successful transformation, since AX ultimately depends on group-wide data infrastructure, investment and cooperation among affiliates rather than any single executive's skill set. Lotte itself appears to treat AX less as an individual leader's assignment and more as a collective innovation drive spanning the entire conglomerate.