Let's Capture Both Economy and Tourism Through Public-Private Cooperation in 'Fintech'

Busan City and Hana Card Co., Ltd. to Sign 'Fintech Industry Promotion Agreement' at 2 PM on the 20th
Fostering Fintech Companies, Boosting Foreign Tourist Spending... Aiming for Economic Revival

Contents of the fintech joint cooperation project between Busan City and Hana Card.

[Asia Economy Yeongnam Reporting Headquarters Reporter Kim Yong-woo] Busan City and Hana Card will sign a ‘Fintech Industry Promotion Cooperation Agreement’ at 2 p.m. on the 20th in the 26th-floor conference room of City Hall.

Fintech is a compound word of financial and technique, referring to a new form of financial technology based on advanced information technology.

About 20 people will attend the signing ceremony, including Byeon Seong-wan, Acting Mayor of Busan, Jang Kyung-hoon, CEO of Hana Card, fintech companies, small business owners, merchant associations, tourism industry representatives, and association heads.

This agreement between Busan City and Hana Card is a public-private collaboration project preparing for the post-COVID-19 era. Promising fintech companies in Busan will be given various collaboration opportunities, and through promoting consumption by foreign tourists, it plans to lay the foundation for the re-acceleration of Busan’s economy.

The two organizations will promote ▲development and operation of a platform based on foreign card payment data through the ‘Busan City-Hana Card Fintech Challenge’ and development of global fintech apps (overseas small remittance, currency exchange, overseas payment, etc.) ▲expansion of WeChat Pay payment infrastructure ▲support for foreigner big data.

The first joint cooperation project, the ‘Busan City-Hana Card Fintech Challenge,’ was promoted as a public contest project since September targeting resident companies of U-Space BIFC, a fintech hub center established by Busan City.

In the final evaluation, ▲the Explore Busan-BTS (Busan Tour Story) project proposed by the consortium of Nexol and Iconloop and ▲the blockchain-based small remittance, currency exchange, and simple payment service project using a multi-channel transaction system proposed by the consortium of Upchain, Barum, and GMC Labs were finally selected.

Each of the two selected projects will receive 10 million KRW in commercialization support funds and an opportunity to participate as joint operators in the Busan City-Hana Card fintech agreement project.

They will also promote the expansion of WeChat Pay payment infrastructure in the Busan area. This is expected to greatly boost consumption by Chinese tourists, who will increase after the post-COVID-19 period, and further revitalize the local economy.

WeChat Pay, a Chinese mobile payment method, has over 800 million monthly users and an average of 1 billion payment transactions per day.

Hana Card, which holds more than 60% market share in the foreigner market among domestic card companies, will provide foreign card usage big data to Busan City.

Based on reliable high-quality data, fintech companies can develop new platforms to secure financial competitiveness, and local small business owners and the tourism industry can utilize it for various purposes.

Jang Kyung-hoon, CEO of Hana Card, said, “I hope this will greatly help foster the fintech industry in the region, and I believe Busan will take a step forward as a digital-based financial hub and international tourism city through the re-acceleration of the local economy and tourism.”

Byeon Seong-wan, Acting Mayor of Busan, said, “Based on the fintech technology and financial infrastructure accumulated by Hana Card, this will be a great opportunity for Busan’s fintech companies to grow into unicorn companies.”

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