Investment

On January 1, the Korea Trade-Investment Promotion Agency (KOTRA) launched the Global M&A Center to address the increase in global mergers and acquisitions (M&A), growing desire among Korean smalland medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) to pursue crossborder M&A transactions and the new government’s pledge to activate the M&A market in Korea.

The Foreign Investment Ombudsman helped a city and company obtain the authoritative regulatory interpretation it needed

SEOUL, KOREA – General Motors (GM) said on April 8 (local time) that it will invest USD 8 billion in South Korea as scheduled. However, GM hinted that there is a need for thrashing out measures to address problems related to the weak yen and ordinary wages.

SEOUL, KOREA – SK Telecom, a South Korean wireless telecommunications operator, will invest KRW 1.2 trillion in ICT convergence mega-projects, such as healthcare, business-to-business (B2B) solutions and future-oriented researches, over the next three years.

Local Firms to Invest More in Research This Year

 R&D investment by Korean companies is expected to edge up this year amid the prolonged economic slowdown, a poll showed last month.

SEOUL, KOREA – The top 600 companies in South Korea are likely to ramp up their investment by 13.9 percent y-o-y to KRW 129.7 trillion this year despite the economic slowdown, according to a poll released by the Federation of Korean Industries (FKI), the country's top business lobby group.

SEOUL, KOREA – Samsung and Intel made investments in the development of voice recognition technology that can serve as an alternative to Apple’s Siri (an intelligent personal assistant that helps users get things done just by asking).

SEOUL, KOREA – In the first quarter of this year, foreign direct investment (FDI) in Korea climbed 45% year-on-year, as huge investments in real estate and brisk M&As offset a rise in the won and geographically risks such as North Korea’s attempts to launch a missile.

SEOUL, KOREA – Back in 1972, Corning Incorporated, a US manufacturer of glass, ceramics, and related materials, forged its relationship with Korea by setting up a liaison office in South Korea. Corning established Samsung Corning in partnership with Samsung in 1973, Samsung Corning Precision Glass in 1995 and Samsung Corning Advanced Glass in 2012.