The Ministry of SMEs and Startups announced on the 29th that 2,626 teams from around the world applied to participate in the 'K-Startup Grand Challenge.'
The K-Startup Grand Challenge is the largest international startup competition in Korea, which started in 2016. Selected businesses will receive Korean market exploration and domestic settlement support programs. This year's number of applications increased 1.5 times compared to the previous year, with a competition ratio of 32.8 to 1 based on a selection criterion of 80 teams.
Applying corporations accounted for 42.7% from Asia, 31.1% from Africa, 10.7% from the Americas, and 8.2% from Europe. By sector, IT and software represented the highest at 29.6%, followed by food and agriculture at 12.5%, and healthcare and bio at 11.4%.
It was analyzed that many excellent corporations participated, with 61.5% having investment attraction results, 70.6% having sales results, and 45.3% having an organization size of more than six.
After the evaluation process, the selected corporations will participate in domestic settlement support programs starting from the end of July, which include Korean market exploration, localization strategy consulting, visa acquisition, and corporate establishment support.
In addition to the K-Startup Grand Challenge, the Ministry of SMEs and Startups is promoting the Korean startup ecosystem and discovering and attracting foreign startups through various support projects. So far, 88 overseas startups have been selected through projects such as K-Scouter, foreign startup commercialization support, and the Startup Korea special visa, achieving 40.4 billion won in investment attraction, 59 jobs created, and 10.6 billion won in sales.
Cho Kyung-won, the director of startup policy, said, “Attracting excellent overseas startups injects new growth momentum into the Korean startup ecosystem,” adding, “I hope many outstanding overseas startups will come to our country through this K-Startup Grand Challenge.”