During the 2018 PyeongChang Olympics, South and North Korean athletes entered the opening ceremony together and formed a joint women’s hockey team, creating momentum that led to bilateral talks between the South and North. Maintaining that legacy and peace building, the PyeongChang Peace Forum 2020 “Peace! Here and Now” takes place through Tuesday at Pyeongchang Alencia in Gangwon Province with 1000 participants from 25 countries. The three-day conference is being attended

Social Affairs Feb. 9, 2020

Herald Corp., which publishes 67-year-old English-language newspaper The Korea Herald, will host the 49th Herald National English Speech Contest. The event is designed to foster creative and logical thinking, as well as foreign-language presentation skills of students, providing them a chance to grow into future leaders. The speech contest was launched in 1953 by Korean Republic, now The Korea Herald, and has helped nurture global leaders. Participation in the contest is open to elementar

Social Affairs Jan. 29, 2020

Seoul needs to form deep connections to the global startup ecosystem, keynote speakers said Thursday at “Start-up Seoul: Tech-Rise 2019,” a startup convention hosted by Seoul City. The event is part of the city’s efforts to draw attention to the local startup ecosystem, called the Challenger Startup Ecosystem in a recent report by Startup Genome, meaning it has the potential to make it into the top 30 within five years. “Seoul’s size is half of the top 20 startup ec

Technology Sept. 6, 2019

Samsung Electronics plans to soon release a wide range of foldable smartphones, including one that folds outward, sources familiar with the matter told The Investor on Thursday. They said the out-folding phone would come ahead of Huawei Technologies’ version of the foldable phone. “The launch date has yet to be unveiled, but it’s likely to be earlier than the date set for Huawei,” said one of the sources on condition of anonymity. “Suppliers have already begun m

Technology June 27, 2019

Not many people know Theodore Dreiser’s 1900 novel “Sister Carrie” in South Korea. For kids here, “Carrie eonni” or Sister Carrie who introduces toys on YouTube is the “president.” Since its YouTube launch in 2014, Carrie has become an influential figure with more than two million subscribers. Early on, CarrieSoft, the company behind Carrie and Toys -- with real-person and animation characters -- has attracted investments from NHN Entertainment and

Industry May 31, 2019

European countries pitched to attract South Korean startups during an event held at the Global Startup Festival Daejeon 2019 on Wednesday. During a sideline event called Startup Talk Concert with Foreign Embassies, officials from Finland, the Netherlands and Australia said their governments and private sector are putting a lot of efforts to nurture domestic and overseas startups. “The Australian government is putting more emphasis on startups as the country shifts from coal and mining

Technology May 22, 2019

BANGKOK -- Thailand, an ASEAN country with a population of 69 million, is messenger platform Line’s second-largest market after Japan. In fact, 90 percent of the country’s mobile internet users are connected via Line, with the monthly number of active users amounting to 44 million. However, the company is now shifting from a messenger tool to an all-in-one app that provides various services ranging from e-commerce to contents. This not only corresponds to the increasing demand by c

Technology May 18, 2019

South Korea’s venture capital industry finally appears to be headed toward a boom, after going through a rough patch during the dot.com bubble in the early 2000s and the global financial crisis that started in 2008. Last year alone, the country saw a record inflow of 3.8 trillion won ($3.2 billion) of venture investment. The figure for the first quarter of this year is poised to set a quarterly record. Based on such explosive growth, veteran venture capitalist Chung Sung-in, who took t

Industry May 7, 2019

CJ is shutting down its loss-making Korean restaurant chain Bibigo in China, with a plan to dissolve the unit by August this year, according to an industry source. The move is part of restructuring of its food and beverage business due to poor profitability. It follows the closure of VIPS, the group’s family restaurant chain that ended operations in March, the source told The Investor on Tuesday on the condition of anonymity. Bibigo restaurants in China took up half of the total n

Industry April 24, 2019

A hair drug test for K-pop singer and actor Park Yoo-chun has returned a positive result, according to police here. Gyeonggi Nambu Provincial Police Agency, which is investigating Park’s case, received the test result from the National Forensic Service on Monday. Police are seeking an arrest warrant for Park. The hair sample, taken from his leg, was collected April 16 and sent for examination. A urine drug test earlier that day had returned a negative result.Park Yoo-chun leaves a police station

Social Affairs April 23, 2019

For the first time since it was founded in 2002, South Korean game developer Smilegate is out to list an affiliate in a bid to diversify its portfolio. Smilegate is the developer of hugely popular shooting game “CrossFire,” which boasts about 650 million users in some 80 countries. Its accumulated overseas sales exceeded 10 trillion won ($8.78 billion) as of April 2018. Contrary to company statements saying it is “simply testing the waters,” industry watchers con

Technology April 10, 2019

South Korea’s retail firm E-Land World is set to sell its subsidiary K-Swiss to a Chinese sports brand six years after it purchased the US company, industry sources said on April 10. E-Land World is scheduled to sign a stock purchase agreement with Xtep this month for about 300 billion won ($262 million), the sources said. A spokesperson declined to confirm the deal with XTep but said that the company has been in talks with many potential buyers since early this year. The Korean re

Industry April 10, 2019

As South Korea’s venture investment hit a record high last year, Korea Venture Investment, South Korea’s fund of funds management institute, saw a jump in revenue growth, data from the Financial Supervisory Service showed on April 4. KVIC logged operating sales of 22.9 billion won ($20.1 million) and operating profit of 6.4 billion won, growing 38.59 percent and 385.76 percent, respectively. Its revenue soared 456.01 percent to 5.3 billion won during the same period, the company&rs

Market April 5, 2019

Terarosa, a coffee chain based in Gangneung,a city in the province of Gangwon, on the east coast of South Korea, has secured investment from the country’s leading impact venture fund that invest in companies creating soical innovations. The joint fund set up by Crevisse Partners and Lime Asset Management called Crevisse-Lime Impact Venture Fund decided to invest in the 15-year-old coffee chain that has 14 outlets around the country, an official at Crevisse told The Investo

Market March 20, 2019