Kim Dong-kwan's Hanwha 'New Vision' Revealed in Color

Kim Dong-kwan "Abandon Big Corporation Mindset and Adopt Startup Mindset"

[Asia Economy Reporter Hwang Yoon-joo] The 'startup management mindset' of Kim Dong-kwan, the third-generation heir of the Hanwha family and Vice President of Hanwha Solutions (Head of Strategy Division, photo), is gaining attention. Kim, who leads the strategy division of Hanwha Solutions, a core affiliate of Hanwha Group, and is responsible for global sales related to renewable energy, is advocating for a transformation into an agile startup rather than competing as a large corporation relying on economies of scale to survive the rapidly changing global competition. This management philosophy, which emphasizes that even large corporations cannot survive without a flexible system and ideas like a startup, is gradually revealing his unique approach.

According to industry sources on the 29th, Hanwha Solutions recently completed the formalization of a new management vision to strengthen its competitiveness in the global market. The new vision, led by Vice President Kim, includes ▲global market penetration ▲strengthening eco-friendly portfolios ▲agile organizational culture. This was done with the intention of implementing consistent directions for sustainable corporate growth and social value creation, from business portfolios to organizational culture, similar to SK Group's 'social value management' and POSCO's 'corporate citizenship.'

Kim's emphasis on startups and eco-friendliness stems from his direct experience with changes in the global energy market over the past few years. Since competing on scale with global energy companies like BASF is impossible, Hanwha Solutions interprets this as the need to survive in global competition by competing with technology and ideas like a startup and providing sustainable solutions.

Accordingly, Hanwha Solutions is implementing changes from organizational culture to performance systems and business portfolios. A representative example is the introduction of the Restricted Stock Unit (RSU) system and short-term, project-based performance management (OKR), which were first adopted among domestic large corporations. RSU is a performance reward system used by companies in Silicon Valley, USA. While domestic large corporations reward employees through stock options, which give the right to purchase company shares at a specific price, the RSU system differs in that shares are granted free of charge if certain conditions set by the company are met.

The performance management system has also shifted from the traditional annual, organization-centered Key Performance Indicators (KPI) to short-term, project-based Objectives and Key Results (OKR). This is also a performance management method used by Silicon Valley companies such as Google and Facebook.

The business portfolio is also planned to focus on eco-friendliness and climate change response in the long term. Recently, 'chemical recycling' has emerged as a key trend in the global chemical industry. This process involves producing biodegradable plastic products or using waste plastics instead of crude oil to manufacture products. Although still in its early stages, global chemical companies like BASF are making large-scale investments, marking the start of competition for market leadership in this field.

A Hanwha official explained, "Vice President Kim has continuously emphasized to internal staff, while attending global stages such as the World Economic Forum Annual Meeting (WEF, Davos Forum), that the trend in the energy business has shifted to an 'energy circular economy.' This means proactively providing climate change solutions not only in solar power generation but also in advanced materials and chemical sectors."

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