Minister Park Young-sun of the Ministry of SMEs and Startups Meets with French Minister... "SME and Startup Cooperation"

On the 18th, Park Young-sun, Minister of SMEs and Startups, and Franck Riester, French Minister for Foreign Trade and Investment, discussed cooperation plans for SMEs and startups between the two countries during a meeting at the Government Seoul Office in Jongno-gu, Seoul.

[Asia Economy Reporter Kim Daehyun] The governments of South Korea and France have agreed to strengthen cooperation in the fields of small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) and startups.

On the 18th, the Ministry of SMEs and Startups announced that Minister Park Young-sun and Frank Riester, French Minister for Foreign Trade and Investment, met at the Government Seoul Office in Jongno-gu, Seoul, to discuss cooperation measures between the two countries in SMEs and startups. This meeting was a follow-up to the joint statement on 'Startup Solidarity and Smart Manufacturing Cooperation Foundation' held last November between Minister Park and C?dric O, French Secretary of State for Digital Affairs at the Ministry of Economy and Finance.

At the meeting, they had detailed discussions on the establishment of the 'K-Startup Center' in Paris, strengthening startup cooperation and mutual market entry, revitalizing joint funds, and the protocol economy.

First, they agreed to actively promote the establishment of the 'K-Startup Center' to support the globalization of Korean startups, which had been delayed due to the COVID-19 pandemic, by monitoring the situation in the first half of next year.

They also agreed to cooperate on joint investments in digital fields such as artificial intelligence (AI) and the Green New Deal sector. Minister Park proposed last November to focus investments through a joint fund established between Korea Venture Investment Corp. (KVIC) and the French public investment bank Bpifrance, and both sides reached a mutual consensus on this.

Cooperation on the protocol economy was also discussed. Minister Park emphasized that the 'protocol economy,' which complements the platform economy, “maximizes synergy among participants to establish a true collaborative relationship,” and stated, “It will be supported as a key project for the digital transformation of SMEs next year.” In response, Minister Frank Riester said, “The protocol economy is a very important complementary policy that alleviates the monopolistic nature of the platform economy,” and added, “I will discuss with Minister C?dric O to ensure that related best practices can be mutually shared in the future.”

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