Following intense parliamentary scrutiny over expertise safety and coverage execution, Korea’s Ministry of SMEs and Startups (MSS) is steering towards a brand new progress chapter. Minister Han Seong-sook outlined a reform roadmap centered on AI, deep-tech, and youth-driven entrepreneurship — signaling that Korea’s subsequent “Enterprise Growth” will hinge not on subsidies, however on scalable innovation and balanced regional alternative.
MSS Outlines Submit-Audit Technique for Startup-Led Development
Talking on the October 14 parliamentary audit, Minister Han Seong-sook revealed that Korea’s Ministry of SMEs and Startups would focus its assets on constructing a extra resilient, innovation-driven economic system by way of AI transformation, deep-tech entrepreneurship, and regional enterprise capital enlargement.
She reaffirmed Korea’s ambition to turn into one of many world’s high 4 enterprise nations, describing the following section as “the Third Enterprise Growth,” as as soon as shared throughout Youth Startup Creativeness Live performance.
Key priorities embrace:
- AI and deep-tech commercialization: Launching the Subsequent Unicorn Undertaking to supply growth-stage funding and technical validation for rising innovators.
- Youth entrepreneurship: Advancing the Startup Rookie Undertaking to find and nurture over 1,000 younger founders annually.
- World enlargement: Establishing a Startup & Enterprise Campus in Silicon Valley to attach Korean founders with U.S. buyers and analysis companions.
- Regional fairness: Creating not less than one regional enterprise mom fund in all 14 non-capital provinces by 2030, addressing the focus of capital within the Seoul metropolitan space.
AI, Deep Tech, and Good Manufacturing Take Middle Stage of MSS Enterprise Coverage Reform
Additional in her rationalization, Minister Han Seong-sook emphasised that future competitiveness is determined by bridging Korea’s expertise functionality with real-world productiveness positive aspects.
The ministry will inject KRW 1.3 trillion from the Fund of Funds to kind KRW 2.6 trillion into new enterprise funds, alongside a KRW 350 billion supplementary finances to speed up AI commercialization and proof-of-concept initiatives.
Relating to manufacturing SMEs, the MSS will introduce “Good Manufacturing 3.0,” constructing on earlier smart-factory packages to advance digital (DX) and AI (AX) transformations throughout industrial provide chains.
Minister Han Seong-sook additionally famous that SME R&D funding has been restored to a report KRW 2.2 trillion, reversing earlier cuts and reflecting a shift towards “profit-driven R&D” designed to extend commercialization success charges.
Minister Han’s Imaginative and prescient: AI, Youth, and Areas as Pillars of the Third Enterprise Growth
Throughout the 2025 Nationwide Audit on October 14, Minister Han Seong-sook additional introduced a deliberate coverage reorientation: from short-term stimulus towards long-term innovation capability.
The ministry goals to align startup coverage, manufacturing modernization, and human-capital funding to make sure that rising founders outdoors the capital area can entry the identical funding and mentorship as their Seoul counterparts.
This method contains partnerships with science and expertise universities to develop regional expertise pipelines and the enlargement of accelerator- and VC-led “enterprise studio” fashions to enhance early-stage incubation high quality.
The minister then declared,
“We’ll make small-business restoration our high precedence and full Korea’s industrial transformation centered on AI and deep tech.”
Turning 2025 Nationwide Audit Stress into Reform Momentum
The brand new measures characterize the federal government’s direct response to points revealed through the 2025 Nationwide Audit — particularly the extreme capital focus within the Seoul metropolitan space and weak enforcement in expertise safety.
By introducing regional enterprise funds and AI-centered trade packages, the Ministry of SMEs and Startups goals to rework legislative criticism into tangible reform.
Throughout the innovation ecosystem, this renewed concentrate on younger founders and sensible manufacturing marks a structural shift — one designed to construct a gradual stream of globally aggressive startups able to sustaining Korea’s management past semiconductors and digital platforms.
MSS at 2025 Nationwide Audit: From Coverage Restore to Reinvention
Lastly, as Korea’s startup ecosystem strikes right into a defining stage, the MSS’s post-audit roadmap blends accountability with strategic ambition. The success of those reforms will decide whether or not Korea achieves a real “Third Enterprise Growth,” powered by AI, deep tech, and inclusive regional progress.
Startups, buyers, and policymakers now face the identical take a look at — turning this coverage imaginative and prescient into outcomes that may be measured in actual progress and competitiveness. As a result of now, Korea’s innovation technique is not about restoration — it’s about reinvention.
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