Tuesday, November 18, 2014

Status of Korean SMEs - SBC

Current Status of SMEs

Korean SMEs play a pivotal role in the national economy, accounting for 99.9% of all enterprises (3 million SMEs), 87.7% of all employees (10.8 million employees), and 47.6% of production.

Every day in Korea, new start-ups are launched. Annually, the pattern of 1 million business start-ups and 0.8 million closures is repeated. Korea's SME ecosystem is dynamic.

Thanks to continuous innovation in technology and management, innovative SMEs (venture businesses, inno-biz* and management-innovative businesses) have higher added value than ordinary businesses. Inno-biz means technologically innovative businesses.

Inno-biz

The Korean government intensively fosters inno-biz as a growth engine of the national economy by designating SMEs with technological competitiveness and growth potential as inno-biz.

The number of Korean inno-biz SMEs is continuously growing through ceaseless technological development and the tripartite cooperation of industry, academia and research institutes.

No. of inno-biz SMEs : 11,526 in 2007 14,626 in 2008 15,940 in 2009 16,243 in 2010

Management-innovative SMEs

Aside from technological innovation, Korean SMEs have endeavored to upgrade their productivity and create new values by innovating non-technological aspects of their business.

Inspired by the importance of innovation, Korea's management- innovative SMEs formed a council in December 2007 for the purpose of expanding and disseminating best practices of innovative management.

No. of management-innovative businesses : 6,510 in 2007 11,324 in 2008 13,988 in 2009 16,642 in 2010

Micro-enterprises

Micro-enterprises are an underlying force in the national economy, accounting for 87.5% of all enterprises (2.69 million), and 38.9% of all employees (5,219,922 persons) as of 2009.

The Korean government set up the Micro-enterprise Assistance Center in 1999 as a professional organization dedicated to providing counseling, advice and information on the start-up and improvement of business.

Traditional Markets

The Korean government strives to revitalize traditional markets by holding national market fairs and regional product expos, and by promoting best practices of traditional markets.

As a self-help organization, the Market Merchant Association runs a joint purchasing/sales and online shopping-mall business to reduce transaction costs. It has also established an information network between production markets with regional specialties and consumption markets in cities.

Oversease Investment

The amount of overseas investment by Korean SMEs has shown an increasing trend from $2,301M to $3,343M and $6,072M until 2008, when it dropped to $5,860M due to difficult fund-raising environment and devaluation of Korean currency triggered by the global financial crisis.

Overseas investment by SMEs comprises 27% of Kore's total overseas investment amount in 2008.
Source: Small and Medium Business Administration

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