Ministry of Culture Establishes 600 Billion Won K-Content Fund

Government to Invest 300 Billion KRW in Mother Fund Culture Account
Film Account Investment Expanded to 53 Billion KRW

The government plans to invigorate the content investment market by establishing a K-Content Fund (Mother Fund Culture Account and Film Account) worth 600 billion KRW this year.

Yoon In-chon, Minister of Culture, Sports and Tourism, promised financial support worth 1 trillion won at a meeting with domestic broadcasting and OTT video content industry representatives held on the 21st of last month at the National Museum of Modern and Contemporary Art, Seoul, in Jongno-gu, Seoul. Photo by Yonhap News

On the 5th, the Ministry of Culture, Sports and Tourism announced that it plans to invest 340 billion KRW through the first regular investment announcement of the K-Content Fund in 2025, building a total venture investment association of 599.6 billion KRW. This is a decrease of 95.4 billion KRW (13.7%) compared to last year's 695 billion KRW.

The Mother Fund Culture Account plans to create a sub-fund totaling 520 billion KRW based on a government investment of 300 billion KRW. The fields are divided into Intellectual Property (IP) Fund, Content Export Fund, New Technology Content Fund, Content Development Fund, and General Culture Fund.

Among these, the Content Export Fund will be established at a scale of 150 billion KRW in response to the growth trend of content exports over the past five years. The New Technology Content Fund, first established last year, will also be built at a scale of 75 billion KRW to expand investment in new technology convergence content.

The Content IP Fund, which supports production companies in securing IP, will be established for the third consecutive year. However, since the government investment amount has decreased by 30 billion KRW from last year to 90 billion KRW, it is expected to be at a scale of 150 billion KRW.

The General Culture Fund will be created at a scale of 120 billion KRW, an increase of 40 billion KRW from last year. A Ministry of Culture, Sports and Tourism official explained, "The main investment scope covers the entire cultural industry sector, allowing for high investment autonomy." The newly established Content Development Fund, aimed at strategically fostering promising companies such as early-stage startups and companies with excellent valuation, will be built at a scale of 25 billion KRW.

The Mother Fund Film Account will expand government investment to 53 billion KRW, creating a total of 79.6 billion KRW. The sub-fund fields have added an Animation Fund to the existing Main Investment Fund and Low-to-Mid Budget Korean Film Fund. A Ministry of Culture, Sports and Tourism official explained, "Considering the contraction of investment in the Korean film industry, we have relaxed investment conditions, such as abolishing the annual investment obligation to invest 25% of the total committed amount within one year of formation."

The newly created Animation Fund aims for a scale of 20 billion KRW. The Ministry explained that it will invest in small and venture companies and projects related to animation, while setting a mandatory investment ratio for theatrical animation projects to support the growth of the related industry.

The Main Investment Fund and Low-to-Mid Budget Korean Film Fund will be established at scales of 39.6 billion KRW and 20 billion KRW, respectively. The Ministry plans to limit the target to production companies holding film IP to induce the growth of strong small production companies.

Proposals for the K-Content Fund can be submitted online from the 12th to the 19th. The final operator will be selected and announced in April. For more details, please refer to the Korea Venture Investment website.