South Korea’s retail giant Lotte Group has registered the trademark of “Lotte Biologics” with the Korean Intellectual Property Office, signaling the conglomerate’s official enter the bio industry.

According to the KIPO, Lotte Holdings applied for Lotte Biologics’ patent last week with business areas including customized manufacturing of biopharmaceuticals, drug processing and medical diagnostic devices for virus testing.

“Registering the trademark of Lotte Biologics was a part of preparations for the group’s bio business. We are reviewing various ways to enter the bio industry, but nothing has been confirmed at the moment,” said a Lotte Holdings official.

Regarding the reports on Lotte’s rumored buyout of a bio factory in the United States, the official said no decisions have been made at the moment.

Last year, Lotte scouted Lee Won-jik, former head of Samsung Biologics’ drug product business unit. Lee is currently the head of the second new growth team, also known as the bio team, under the group’s ESG management innovation office.

Lotte will also participate in this year’s Bio International Convention -- the world’s biggest convention for the global bio industry organized by the Biotechnology Innovation Organization -- in San Diego from June 13-16.

The conglomerate had previously registered for the event with the name of Lotte Biologics, but changed the exhibitor’s name to Lotte after the former registration name stirred up speculations of contract development and manufacturing operations.

The Lotte Holdings official told The Korea Herald that the change was made to prevent any misunderstanding in the group’s approach to the bio industry as it remains open to all business areas.

“Because the 2022 Bio International Convention is the bio industry’s largest event where we can see and learn the trends and insights in regard to our bio business areas in preparation, we are taking part in this year’s event,” said the official.

Earlier, Lotte Group announced that bio and health care businesses would be its growth engine for the future at the shareholders’ meeting in March. Lee Dong-woo, CEO of Lotte Holdings, said the firm plans to directly invest in these fields and foster them in the mid- to long-term.