South Korea's telecom and industry authorities said Monday they plan to invest 50 billion won ($48.7 million) by 2019 into the Internet of Things (IoT) industry, seeking to tap deeper into a new source of profit in the country's technology realm.

Under the plan, the Ministry of Science, ICT and Future Planning and the Ministry of Trade, Industry and Energy will allocate 37 billion won over five years from next year to develop core technologies related to the IoT.

The IoT refers to a computing concept in which all physical objects are connected to the Internet and are able to identify themselves to other devices and exchange related data for improved efficiency and convenience.

Also called the Internet of Everything, a smart car logged on to the Internet to provide drivers with better traffic data is an example of the latest trend in the global technology industry.

Of the investment by the two ministries, 20.5 billion won will go toward developing Micro-electromechanical System sensor chips, and the remaining 16.5 billion won to broadband sensing devices, related officials said.

With another 12.3 billion won being secured from the private sector, the combined investment on the IoT industry is expected to amount to about 50 billion won.

The government is also planning to foster IoT technology specialists, officials said.

They said the combined production value of the IoT MEMS sensors will be expanded to 230 billion won by 2020 from the 70 billion won last year, in a bid to reduce South Korea's heave dependency on imports in the sector. (Yonhap)