Looking outside Korea for funding for Incheon
As following last year, Incheon's IT Technology is expected to shine once again at the forthcoming Consumer Electronics Show (CES) 2007 which will be held in January 2007 at Las Vegas, United States.
The Incheon Information Technology Industry Promotion Agency's role to back up IT companies in Incheon is becoming an object of attention. For reference, the Incheon Information Technology Industry Promotion Agency (IITPAwww. iit.or.kr) helped Incheon IT companies contract exports worth US$10.14 million at CES 2006 by surveying US buyers in advance to support participating companies' marketing.
Last year, Incheon IT companies unfolded export business talks worth US$94.85 million through a total of 694 business meetings with buyers. Export contracts amounted to US$10.14 million and Namjoo Tech especially finalized an export contract worth US$7 million.
In conjunction with Incheon IT companies CES 2007 exhibition participation, president Eugene Jun, IITPA points out: "A means to live for Incheon IT companies is that only overseas market inroads through exports is a solution to an impasse."
Incheon area's IT companies possess crack products and potentially lucrative technology, but because the greater part of their products are not escaping from poor subcontract level surroundings for larger corporations, they are reaching the boundary of turnover, Jun said.
The president pointed out: "Due to absence of operation specific manpower, marketing, unverified technology power and weak brand power, Incheon IT companies are suffering from difficulties for overseas market inroads independently for themselves." Incheon IT companies are reaching at the boundary of domestic marketing because they are near the metropolitan area. They are especially facing difficulties in terms of domestic market inroads because large corporation and collaboration companies are preoccupying the domestic market, he said.
However, despite high oil prices and the decline of the exchange rate, the relative importance of IT industry exports among the entire industries at home is presumed to post 9.8% in 2006, Jun explained.
The IITPA was established to expand related industry growth bases by supporting local IT industries and to contribute to strengthening local industry competitiveness and development.
It is said that the IITPA also carries out regional innovation industry projects in the logistics industry (RFID/USN, logistics innovation center), auto industry (IT component, telematics), mechanics metal industry (new materials related technology development), and information telecommunication industry (embedded software, digital content), according to Jun.
Thanks to IITPA's efforts, Incheon IT industry's total turnover has increased from 4.2948 trillion won (US$4.7 billion) in 2004 to 5.8904 trillion won (US$6.4 billion) in 2005. The number of persons employed has also increased from 27,426 persons in 2004 to 34,557 persons in 2005.
Regarding national-policy projects, the IITPA is propelling 3D image core technology development by April 2010, in which 11 companies including Pavonine, Inc. and universities such as Inha University and Incheon University take part within the Incheon area. An RFID Convergence Platform development project to be carried out by December 2007 aims to nurture value-added industry by localizing RFID smart terminal aviation logistics system construction by applying cuttingedge IT technology.
In addition, the IITPA is operating an Incheon Venture Fund for the purpose of nurturing cuttingedge venture start-up with a scale of 10.5 billion won (US$11.40 million). Jun added that as of end of July, 2006, this Incheon Venture Fund has invested 3 billion won (US$3.7 million) in Incheon IT companies.
This Fund's staple investment fields include information telecommunication/IT service field, electronics semiconductor field, computer game field, and biotechnology field.
