This June Skolkovo saw the biggest in its history delegation from Korea. Representatives of 30 companies, development institutions and technoparks together with Mr. Park Ro-byug Korean Ambassador in Russia visited Startup Village event.
Their main objective was to participate in session “GOING GLOBAL: OPPORTUNITIES IN THE KOREAN MARKET”. In 2015 South Korea ranked first among all countries in the Bloomberg Global Innovation Index. The country has become the acknowledged leader in ICT and patent activity. Korean tech giants such as Samsung (one of the key partners of the Skolkovo Project) spend billions of U.S. dollars on R&D annually, and Korean small research-intense businesses are attracting the notice of global industry players and venture funds.
The speakers representing governmental, business and scientific circles of South Korea have shaded light on country’s innovation ecosystem. This session also gave an opportunity to learn about Russian-Korean tech cooperation from the Skolkovo top managers and meet a delegation of Korean SMEs and development institutions.
The honorable speaker was Mr. Kwak Jae Won, President of GSTEP (Gyeonggi Institute of Science & Technology Promotion), who talked about Gyeonggi-Skolkovo cooperation – what were the expectations and potential outcomes for startups.
One of the brightest moments was the singing of MOU between Skolkovo Technopark and GSTEP. The decision to launch cooperation by MOU was made in December 2014 during a visit of IT cluster top management to Korea that brought fruitful results.
In September 2015 Skolkovo plans to organize a huge business mission to Korea aiming to launch cooperation between Skolkovo startups and Korean industries, to present benefits that Skolkovo offers to foreign companies which are interested to enter Russian market. Furthermore, we are proud to announce that within this mission Skolkovo Innovation Center and Gyeonggi Province will sign an agreement bringing relations between Russia and Korea to a new level.
First contacts with Korean partners were established at the very beginning of Skolkovo activities. From governmental institutes to industrial companies, from technoparks to research centers - during 5 years Skolkovo has had an efficient cooperation with Korean innovation community.