How Samsung’s first-ever chief design officer is reinventing the electronics giant for the AI age

If Mauro Porcini’s mother had had her way, Samsung Electronics’ head designer wouldn’t have gone into design at all. “She wanted me to be a priest,” the Italian-born Porcini says, as he sits in his new office at Samsung’s R&D center, just outside Seoul’s buzzy Gangnam district, on a frigid December morning. 

Porcini did not take his mother’s advice and join the priesthood. But he does see his current job in corporate design as something like a higher calling. 

“It felt like faith, God, or whatever you believe in was looking down and saying, ‘Wait a second—before going after your dream, you need to prepare yourself. You need to be ready,’” Porcini says. 

Porcini is more than ready for his new job as Samsung Electronics’ chief design officer, which he started last year. The 50-year-old has corporate design credentials few can match. He’s served as design chief at 3M and PepsiCo and started his career as a product designer at Philips. Now, at Samsung, he has w...