Selection of Korea's Top Fabless Startup... Up to 200 Million KRW Support

'Fabless Challenge' Final Selection of 5 Companies
Support for 3 Foundries, Process Technology, and More

The Ministry of SMEs and Startups announced on the 6th that it held the '2024 Fabless Challenge' awards ceremony at the Four Seasons Hotel in Seoul.

Minister Oh Young-joo of the Ministry of SMEs and Startups is speaking at the 'Fabless Startup Meeting' held on June 13 at the Seoul Creative Economy Innovation Center.
[Photo by Ministry of SMEs and Startups]

The Fabless Challenge is an annual event held since 2022 to strengthen the domestic system semiconductor industry ecosystem and provide opportunities for promising fabless startups and domestic foundries to grow together and create innovative achievements.

Previously, only Samsung Electronics Foundry participated in the challenge, but this time, all domestic foundries participated for the first time as DB HiTek and SK Hynix Foundry accepted the challenge participation request proposed by the Fabless Industry Association. The support budget per selected company was also expanded to up to 200 million KRW.

The final five companies selected through step-by-step evaluations including document and presentation assessments conducted jointly with domestic foundries and experts are 'ICTK', 'Qualitas Semiconductor', 'TruePixel', 'EMCoreTech', and 'Power LSI'.

For the final selected startups, the three foundries will provide priority access to multi-project wafer (MPW) prototype manufacturing processes along with support for process technologies. The Ministry of SMEs and Startups will support the required costs ranging from 100 million KRW to up to 200 million KRW per company.

The Ministry plans to continuously increase support policies for the growth and global expansion of fabless startups, which play the brain part in the system semiconductor industry ecosystem. In particular, it plans to classify the growth stages of fabless startups by business age and technological capability, and provide tailored support for design assets, prototype manufacturing processes, demand-based collaboration with domestic and international large companies, product verification, and investment attraction needed for growth at each stage.

Minister Oh Young-joo of the Ministry of SMEs and Startups said, “Fabless and foundries are organically connected in the system semiconductor value chain, so balanced growth through cooperation is essential for the industry to develop. Through the Fabless Challenge, we expect domestic foundries to secure promising unicorn fabless startups, and fabless startups to accelerate the development of new technology semiconductors and create innovative achievements.”