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KIST Leads R&D Support for Women-owned Businesses (2016.06.15)
- Date : 2016-11-09
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KIST Leads R&D Support for Women-owned Businesses
- New MOU helps empower female entrepreneurs -
The Korea Institute of Science and Technology (KIST), the Korean Women Entrepreneurs Association (KWEA), the Industrial Bank of Korea (IBK), the Korea Technology Finance Corporation, KISTA and Capital One signed an MOU to support growth of women-owned businesses at KIST’s headquarters in Seoul on June 15.
KWEA is an umbrella organization for women-led companies in Korea. It has 16 branches and a national network of 2,500 members. Through support from partner organizations, it provides business assistance to enterprises run by women.
To help support the companies that comprise KWEA, KIST provides technology matching and knowledge transfers, as well as free patent sharing and advice for resolving technical challenges; IBK provides consultations on business operations and risk management; KISTA supports the creation, enhancement and utilization if IP through specialized workforces. The Korea Technology Finance Corporation helps KWEA members identify new business opportunities through technical evaluations and financing and Capital One provides preferential investment to help grow companies affiliated with KWEA.
Baek Woon-man, Director of the Small and Medium Business Administration; Choi Doyoung, Support Team Leader at the Research Institute of the Ministry of Science, ICT and Future Planning; Yoon Seok-jin, Convergence Research Director at the National Research Council of Science and Technology; and representatives from 20 KWEA member companies attended the MOU’s signing in order to discuss support measures for women-owned companies.
As a part of the signing event, KIST and two representative KWEA members conducted a patent-sharing ceremony*, soon followed by a technology transfer ceremony between KIST and two other KWEA companies.
*KIST shared 26 patents with 14 businesses at this event.
At the technological exchange meeting organized by KIST’s Small and Medium Enterprise Support Center, representatives from 12 KWEA member companies met with public officials and 20 KIST researchers to discuss ways of resolving various technical challenges. In the future, KIST and KWEA member companies will hold a technical exchange meeting in both the first and second halves of each year.
KIST President Dr. Lee Byung Gwon said, “Through this MOU, KIST will continue to provide active support in creating tangible results, such as increased revenue, for women-led businesses.”