A Visit to the 2025 Gwanak S Valley Startup Festival
Eight Years of Dedicated Effort to Build Gwanak S Valley
Education Support Budget Increased from 1.5 Billion to 10 Billion Won
Leaping from a Bedroom Community to an Innovative Economic City
The hands of elementary school students operating the educational programming robot Kamibot were busy in motion. When asked to explain how to control Kamibot, one of the students handed a tablet controller to Park Junhee, Mayor of Gwanak District.
"Would you like to show the mayor how it works?" "This one turns right, this one turns left. This one goes forward, and that one goes backward."
Park Junhee, Mayor of Gwanak District (center), is listening to an explanation about controller operation from elementary school students at the "2005 Gwanak S Valley Startup Festival - Robot & AI Competition" held on the 19th. Provided by Gwanak District.
On the afternoon of September 19, the "Seoul National University Robot & AI Competition" was held in the auditorium on the 7th floor of the Gwanak District Office annex in Seoul. Thirty-six elementary school students from the Seoul area were divided into lower and upper grades and competed by controlling robots. The lower-grade students operated logistics robots busily to secure more blocks than their peers. The upper-grade students used robot grippers (robotic hands) to pick up and move blocks. Perhaps because the robot control was set up as a game, the children's concentration was remarkable.
Mayor Park Junhee, who visited the event, said, "When children operate robots from a young age and become interested and focused, they naturally begin to dream of becoming researchers or venture entrepreneurs. That is exactly why I believe it is essential to provide robot and artificial intelligence (AI) education to elementary school students."
The Robot & AI Competition was one of the events at the "2025 Gwanak S Valley Startup Festival" held at the Gwanak District Office that day. Mayor Park, who has been promoting the Gwanak S Valley policy as a core pledge, launched the startup festival in 2019, and this year marks its sixth edition. The district office, Seoul National University, and the Seoul Startup Center Gwanak co-host the event.
In the main lobby of the district office, promotional booths for companies based in Gwanak S Valley, a robot experience zone, and panel exhibitions were set up. In the main auditorium and surrounding venues, there were special lectures, a startup talk show, a live startup idea pitch contest, and one-on-one investment consulting sessions for entrepreneurs. Startups such as Pmatch, Jureongjureong Studio, ArtoAI, and Linkroot, which are based in the Nakseong Venture Startup Center and other facilities, also participated.
Mayor Park said, "Gwanak District is home to Seoul National University and has the largest youth population, making it a highly competitive area. However, in the past, it remained just a bedroom community. Just as Silicon Valley is located near Stanford University in the United States, the idea behind Gwanak S Valley is to create an innovative economic city by transforming the area around a top university into a startup valley."
"A Neighborhood That Could Be Silicon Valley Should Not Remain a Bedroom Community"
Mayor Park emphasized the importance of "early education in robotics and AI." He said, "It is more important than anything else to create opportunities for students living in the era of the Fourth Industrial Revolution to encounter AI early. That is why the district office is providing funding to develop and operate AI education programs in all elementary schools in the district."
For this reason, he gradually increased the district's budget for supporting educational expenses at local elementary, middle, and high schools from only 1.5 billion won in 2018 to 10 billion won this year.
Mayor Park said, "When I took office in 2018, I saw that the budget was far too small, so I set a goal to increase it to 10 billion won, and this year I achieved that goal. Strengthening AI education for elementary students is absolutely necessary," he reiterated. He added, "For a venture startup city to grow into an innovative economic city, we must create an environment where our children can encounter and participate in AI from an early age."
Mayor Park also plans to resume on-site robotics education for elementary students, which was suspended before the COVID-19 pandemic, depending on circumstances. The program involves selecting elementary school students through a screening process and providing them with intensive instruction for about six months.
Mayor Park said, "Venture startups that turn imagination into reality and technology, changing the world, are something Korea must lead and are the future path for our country. I will continue to support startups in Gwanak so that many of them can settle, grow into unicorn companies, and contribute to job creation and regional development."
Park Junhee, mayor of Gwanak District (center), is operating a robot at the promotional and experience zone of the '2005 Gwanak S Valley Startup Festival' on the 19th. Provided by Gwanak District.
*Gwanak S Valley is
a startup and innovation ecosystem hub established by Gwanak District in cooperation with Seoul National University. It is a regional economic policy project aimed at supporting youth entrepreneurship and fostering global unicorn companies. The "S" in the name stands for multiple meanings, including Startup, Star, and Seoul National University. Gwanak District is also working with the Seoul Metropolitan Government and Seoul National University to develop a large-scale startup base by converting part of Nakseongdae Park in Bongcheon-dong (73,000 square meters) from parkland into a startup space.
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