This Year's Best Foreign K-Startup... Singapore's 'Marinachain' Selected

Demo Day Held from October 31 to November 2
Additional Settlement Support Funds Provided to Top 20 Teams

On November 2nd, at the Lotte World Tower in Songpa-gu, Seoul, Deputy Minister Oh Ki-woong of the Ministry of SMEs and Startups and the award-winning teams are taking a commemorative photo at the 'K-Startup Grand Challenge 2023' awards ceremony.
[Photo by Ministry of SMEs and Startups]

MarinaChain from Singapore was selected as the foreign startup team that showed the most outstanding performance in Korea this year.

The Ministry of SMEs and Startups announced this result after holding the 'K-Startup Grand Challenge 2023' Demo Day at Lotte World Hotel in Songpa-gu, Seoul, from the 31st of last month to the 2nd.

At the awards ceremony, MarinaChain received a prize of $120,000. MarinaChain provides carbon software-service solutions to gas terminals, shipyards, and shipowners in the shipping industry.

The second place team was Luckmon from the United States, and the third place team was ANIWARE Company Limited from Hong Kong. Luckmon is a game loyalty platform targeting gamers, and ANIWARE is an AI-based health diagnosis and monitoring platform for pets.

The K-Startup Grand Challenge is a program that supports excellent foreigners to start businesses and settle in Korea. This year, a total of 1,924 teams from 108 countries worldwide applied. After auditions, 41 startup teams were selected to enter Korea, and they prepared for the Demo Day at the Pangyo Startup Campus since August. Among them, the top 20 teams were finally selected at the Demo Day.

Including the five teams that received prize money, the top 20 teams will be given an additional settlement support fund of approximately 1.225 billion KRW over about 15 weeks. To help them advance their business models, additional incubation by domestic startup planners, networking, and office space at the Pangyo Startup Campus will be provided until the first half of next year.

O Gi-woong, Vice Minister of the Ministry of SMEs and Startups, emphasized in his encouragement speech, “We will drastically improve the startup and employment visa system, operate dedicated institutions supporting foreigners’ startups in Korea, and fundamentally enhance related infrastructure,” adding, “We will realize the vision of becoming ‘Asia’s No. 1 and one of the world’s top 3 startup countries.’”