Invitation Meeting with CEOs of Innovation Award-Winning Companies
Listening to On-Site Voices on Challenges in Overseas Market Entry
Oh Young-joo, Minister of the Ministry of SMEs and Startups, emphasized actively supporting companies that received Innovation Awards at the international electronics exhibition 'CES 2024' in their global expansion efforts.
On the 18th, Minister Oh held a meeting with representatives of the CES 2024 Innovation Award-winning companies at the Seoul Creative Economy Innovation Center located in Yongsan-gu, Seoul.
This meeting was organized to celebrate domestic venture and startup companies that won Innovation Awards at CES 2024, held from the 9th to the 12th in Las Vegas, USA, and to communicate by listening to voices from the field.
The CES Innovation Award is given by the Consumer Technology Association (CTA), the organizer of the exhibition, to innovative technologies and products leading the world, and is considered the highest honor at CES.
Minister Oh Young-joo of the Ministry of SMEs and Startups is explaining the main policies of the ministry at the 2024 Policy Direction Briefing held on the 11th at the Korea Federation of SMEs in Yeouido, Yeongdeungpo-gu, Seoul. Photo by Jo Yong-jun jun21@
Record Number of CES Innovation Award-Winning Companies
At CES 2024, a total of 128 domestic venture and startup companies won Innovation Awards, achieving the highest record. Looking at the award details, this year, a total of 362 companies were selected worldwide as Innovation Award winners across 29 fields including artificial intelligence (AI), digital health, smart cities, and robotics.
Among the Innovation Award winners, 150 companies (41.4%) were domestic, and 128 of these, accounting for 85.3% of the domestic winners, were venture and startup companies. Additionally, 106 companies (70.7%) were startups established within the last seven years, marking the highest number of awards ever.
The 'Best of Innovation' award, given to companies with the most innovative technologies and products in each exhibition category, was awarded to a total of 33 companies worldwide. Among them, 12 were domestic companies, with 8 being venture and startup companies (Midbar, Studio Lab, Top Table, Onecom, Flow Studio, Road System, Zcrypto, Mandro). This year also marked the highest number of Best of Innovation awards won by venture and startup companies.
"Policy Focused on Global Expansion"
Minister Oh expressed at the meeting, “I am very proud of the great achievements of Korean ventures and startups showcasing innovative technologies and products at CES 2024. I truly feel that the status of Korean startups on the global stage has risen as the startup ecosystem in Korea has grown both qualitatively and quantitatively.”
Minister Oh then listened to explanations about the award-winning products and technologies of the companies participating in CES 2024, as well as their impressions of receiving the Innovation Awards. Time was also spent hearing about various difficulties faced during startup and growth processes and global expansion.
CEOs attending the meeting also requested continuous government interest and support for the growth, leap, and global market entry of venture and startup companies.
In response, Minister Oh explained, “Considering the borderless digital economy era and the limited domestic market, overseas expansion for startups is not a choice but a necessity. The Ministry of SMEs and Startups has prepared customized policies necessary for startup growth by referring to field opinions, centered on the 'Startup Korea Plan' announced last August to propel Korea into a global startup powerhouse.”
She added, “We will focus our policy capabilities on globalizing our venture and startup ecosystem by creating the Startup Korea Fund and easing regulations on corporate venture capital to foster a private-sector-led venture investment ecosystem.”
Furthermore, Minister Oh expressed a strong commitment to actively support startups’ scale-up and globalization through strengthening global capabilities and supporting overseas startups, so that excellent startups can grow into global companies not only domestically but worldwide.
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