SK Square affiliates eye May IPOs

SK Square is poised for two stock market flotations of its key affiliates -- a mobile app marketplace and a security service -- on the Korea Exchange in May, filings showed Monday. The initial public offerings of the subsidiaries will amount to up to 1.33 trillion won ($1.09 billion) if combined, in the first two attempts since SK Square was spun off from Korea’s largest telecom carrier SK Telecom. SK Shieldus, a security service subsidiary of SK Square formerly known as ADT Caps, aims

April 4, 2022

[CONTRIBUTION] Key to successful digital platform government through lens of big data

Each time a new presidential administration took office, promises surrounding information technology were repeatedly made in a bid to appeal to the public. The military regime and the Kim Young-sam administration’s pledges to foster an information and communications network were followed by the Kim Dae-jung administration’s policies to promote venture businesses. President Roh Moo-hyun envisioned the transition to an e-government, Lee Myung-bak outlined an IT convergence plan, Park

April 4, 2022

‘Workcation’: Mixing work, vacation for both productivity, creativity

Oh Chung-hee, a product designer at Korean fintech startup Toss, was at first reluctant to go on a two-week “workcation,” worrying it was going to be a hassle. But her worries melted away soon after she arrived at the company’s workcation site in the southern coastal region of Namhae, South Gyeongsang Province. Instead of going to work on a jam-packed bus or subway like others in Seoul, Oh started her day by enjoying the vast open scenery and fresh air. “Changing the wo

April 3, 2022

Rare Samsung-LG alliance imminent on OLED TVs: sources

A rare partnership between crosstown rivals Samsung and LG seems imminent, as they are finalizing talks on LG’s panel supply for Samsung’s upcoming OLED TVs, industry sources said Thursday. “Until early this year, the outlook for their partnership was dimming at least for this year. But the talks have recently been speeding up,” said an industry source on condition of anonymity. The source predicted the first panel shipments could start as early as September, considerin

March 31, 2022

[Weekender] Rise of never-aging young women in Korea

South Korea’s entertainment and commercial fields have seen a rise of beautiful, multi-talented young women capable of doing almost everything -- from acting to fashion design. Despite being in their early 20s, they display impeccable skills and give performances that exceed human expectations. They have no stress, no sleep and no scandals. Though they are labeled as perfect human beings, they have their own limits. They are not actual people, but virtual humans produced by cutting-edge co

March 31, 2022

SK Bioscience CEO says financing ready for M&As

SK Bioscience will look to spend “trillions of won” on aggressive mergers and acquisitions in taking the next step to become a vaccine and bio powerhouse, CEO Ahn Jae-yong said Thursday. “We will secure more funding through the assets compiled with the (initial public offering), operating cash and additional acquisition financing,” he said in an online press conference to mark the company’s one-year anniversary of going public. “We will use the funding on

March 31, 2022

SK hynix mulls consortium for Arm acquisition

SK hynix, the world’s second-largest memory chip maker, is considering coinvesting in the acquisition of United Kingdom-based semiconductor design firm Arm by taking part in a consortium, its co-chief executive officer Park Jung-ho told reporters Wednesday. “We are considering coinvesting in Arm with other companies,” Park said in a briefing. “Arm plays a very important role in the international semiconductor ecosystem, and the ecosystem will not allow a single entity t

March 30, 2022

KT to debut disinfection robots in April

South Korean telecom carrier KT, having already launched several robots for hotels and restaurants, is now posed to debut new robots fighting virus infections, laying a basis for its foray into the service robot and rental services business. During a media event held Wednesday, the company said it plans to sell or rent up to 4,000 disinfection robots from April until the end of this year, targeting hospitals, government buildings and welfare facilities. Its autonomous robots, which come in t

March 30, 2022

'AI technology to halve new drug development period'

The technology of artificial intelligence will be used in every step of developing drugs to cut the time it takes to discover a new drug in half, the newly appointed leader of the Korea AI Center for Drug Discovery and Development said Wednesday. “Starting from designing candidate substances, AI technology can set up clinical trials based on biometric data and minimize uncertainty, time and cost by deriving the optimal patient group,” said Kim Woo-youn, head of KAICD at the Korea P

March 30, 2022

Huawei to place R&D first

Chinese tech giant Huawei Technologies pledged to put research and development as a top priority to weather uncertainties and maintain its business continuity, as its R&D expense reached the highest in a decade last year. “Both our R&D expense quantity and R&D expense ratio reached a 10–year high last year,” Karl Song, vice president of corporate communications at Huawei, told reporters in Seoul Tuesday. “The harder things get, the more we are investing in

March 30, 2022

[Herald Interview] Samsung CEO’s apology over GOS throttling not enough: US lawyer

A public apology delivered by a Samsung Electronics CEO earlier this month and a software update are not enough to conciliate customers’ anger, a US attorney claimed, urging the tech giant to provide compensation. Customers are disappointed largely because Samsung sold devices that are not what they meant to be and not as premium as they were promoted in terms of phone and battery performance, said David Buchanan, a partner at Seeger Weiss in New Jersey who is suing Samsung on behalf of

March 29, 2022

BIZA Metaversity brings educational institutions together

BIZA Metaversity is AMAXG Group’s decentralized two-way artificial intelligence platform for education. A compound of “metaverse” and “university,” Metaversity expands the scope of educational institutions to the virtual world and brings different institutions together. It is a non-face-to-face web conferencing smart educational platform where anyone can be a lecturer. Educational institutions around the world including elementary, middle and high schools, uni

March 29, 2022

Digital asset NFT trading platform BIZA UVIT pioneers new genre

AMAXG Group’s BIZA-UVIT is a digital asset trading platform for non-fungible tokens (NFT) in content, culture, art, e-sports, movable assets and real estate. AMAXG built strategic partnerships with a number of organizations including the Federation of Artistic and Cultural Organizations of Korea (FACO), the Global Medical Aesthetic Exchange Association (GMAEA) and the Korea Blockchain Enterprise Promotion Association, and is quickly entering the business of digitally tokenizing user&rsquo

March 29, 2022

SK Square unveils W2tr bet on chips, blockchain

SK Square, an investment arm of South Korea‘s third-largest conglomerate, said Monday it plans to spend at least 2 trillion won ($1.6 billion) over the next three years in the field of semiconductor chips and blockchain technology. It is the first time SK Square unveiled its investment roadmap since November, when it spun off from telecommunication affiliate SK Telecom. Under the plan, announced during its shareholder meeting held Monday, SK Square will target chip companies in the Uni

March 28, 2022

SKT to mount 5G MEC solutions on Dell’s servers

US tech giant Dell Technologies and South Korean mobile carrier SK Telecom said Monday they would forge a multi-access edge computing alliance to expand its global 5G footprint targeting enterprise and government clients. Under the plan, SK Telecom’s 5G MEC solutions -- ranging from network virtualization to MEC application for operation and user experience optimization -- will be mounted on Dell‘s servers to meet the global demand for 5G private network infrastructure. Moreover,

March 28, 2022

KT shares hit 1-year high

The share price of South Korean telecommunications firm KT hit the highest level in a year on Friday, as its shareholder meeting and a carve-out of its key business is drawing to a close next week. A KT common share, which trades on the Korea Exchange, hit the 52-week high at 35,300 won ($28.84) during the intraday trade Friday. The closing price came to 35,000 won apiece, up 1.2 percent from Thursday. KT’s market cap on Thursday exceeded 9 trillion won for the first time in seven months

March 27, 2022

LG Energy Solution commits $2b for North America expansion

South Korea’s battery maker LG Energy Solution on Thursday announced plans to build a 4.8 trillion-won ($4.1 billion) lithium-ion battery plant in Ontario, Canada with carmaker Stellantis and a 1.7 trillion-won cylindrical battery plant in Arizona, a first of its kind in the United States. To support the plan, LG Energy Solution approved a combined capital commitment of $2 billion over the course of the construction, which gained board approval Wednesday, showed filings with the Financial

March 24, 2022

Dongnae raises W25b in Series A funding

Dongnae, Korea’s real estate startup platform, said Wednesday it has raised 25 billion won ($21 million) in Series A funding from US and Korean investors. Key investors include NFX, Daol Investment, Hana-Magna, Hana Financial Group, MetaProp, Fursys, Han River Partners, Flybridge, Maple, and WeWork co-founder Miguel McKelvey. “We plan to expand Dongnae branches in Seoul and in the Seoul metropolitan area, like the Pangyo office in Gyeonggi Province,” a Dongnae official said.

March 23, 2022

SK becomes world’s 1st buyer of ‘net-zero oil’

SK Trading International, a subsidiary of South Korean refiner SK Innovation, announced Wednesday plans to purchase up to 200,000 barrels of “net-zero oil” each year for five years from US-based Occidental Petroleum Corp., in a move to use the sustainable commodity for commercial products. The affiliates of SK Group, South Korea’s third-largest conglomerate by assets, will use the oil for products including eco-friendly aviation fuel. SK’s purchase of net-zero oil will b

March 23, 2022

LG opens AI research base in US

LG AI Research, an in-house research hub of South Korea‘s fourth-largest conglomerate, said Wednesday it has opened a new research center in the United States. The center is located in Ann Arbor, Michigan, near the University of Michigan. It is LG AI Research’s first overseas location. The new facility will be led by Lee Hong-lak, chief scientist of AI and professor of electrical engineering and computer science at the University of Michigan. The center’s fundamental researc

March 23, 2022