Gwangju City Bitgreen Industry-Academia Convergence District Project Selected in Ministry of Trade, Industry and Energy Competition

Gwangju City Hall

[Asia Economy Honam Reporting Headquarters Reporter Park Seon-gang] Gwangju Metropolitan City announced on the 7th that the Bitgreen Industry-Academia Convergence District Development Project, which is being promoted to complete the Gwangju-type job model, was finally selected in the 2019 Ministry of Trade, Industry and Energy public contest.

The Industry-Academia Convergence District Development Project is a large-scale national project conducted to spatially integrate industrial complexes with universities and realize a field-centered industry-academia convergence education system by clustering research and development (R&D), workforce training, and employment.

In this contest, Gwangju City, Chonnam National University, Gwangju Technopark, Industrial Complex Corporation, Green Car Promotion Agency, and Automotive Parts Research Institute formed a consortium and jointly participated to designate the Industry-Academia Convergence District within the Bitgreen Industrial Complex.

With the selection in the contest, Gwangju City will receive 12 billion KRW in national funding over the next six years, and in addition to the national funds, it will invest 12 billion KRW from city funds and 1 billion KRW from the private sector to build infrastructure such as an Industry-Academia Convergence Campus and corporate research centers within the Bitgreen Industrial Complex.

Furthermore, a new industry-academia cooperation model will be established for research and development involving schools, companies, students, and employees, as well as workforce training centered on corporate demand and virtuous cycle employment, contributing to increased sales and job creation.

About 200 students from Chonnam National University’s regular degree program in Intelligent Mobility Convergence Major will transfer to the newly established Industry-Academia Convergence Campus, and around 50 companies will move into the corporate research center.

This will establish a continuous cooperation system between companies and universities and support excellent talents to find employment or start businesses within the region.

Additionally, in the Bitgreen Industry-Academia Convergence District, various programs will be developed and operated to foster technological innovation and research in small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) and nurture young talents tailored to field and corporate needs, including ▲ lifelong learning for workers (re-education type contract departments, employment-linked contract departments, non-degree programs, high school student internships, etc.) ▲ field-customized curricula (Project Lab, Business Lab, R&D internships, etc.) ▲ SME capacity enhancement (Industry-Academia Convergence R&D, Equipment Support Center, Corporate Research Center, Business Solution Center, etc.).

Gwangju City expects that this project will also give momentum to the Gwangju-type job model.

Son Kyung-jong, Director of the AI Industry Bureau of Gwangju City, said, “Through the Bitgreen Industry-Academia Convergence District Development Project, we expect to greatly contribute to the completion of the Gwangju-type job model by establishing a virtuous cycle system where universities provide infrastructure to companies and companies receive the high-level talent they need.”

Meanwhile, the Bitgreen Industrial Complex, where the Industry-Academia Convergence District will be established, is an automobile-exclusive industrial complex being developed as an eco-friendly automobile parts cluster with an investment of 303 billion KRW by Gwangju City and the government.

This content was produced with the assistance of AI translation services.