[Asia Exclusive] The Endless Challenge of the First Generation Venture: "One Year Left in Term, More Plans to Unfold"

Interview with Jang Young-seung, CEO of Seoul Business Agency
Leading the Way to Entrepreneurship, Not Just Career or Employment... Founded Nanum Technology in 1990 with Four Colleagues
Will Continuously Support the Startup Ecosystem through SW Startup Organizations 'SSAK' and 'Seoul Made'

Jang Young-seung, CEO of the Seoul Business Agency, emphasized in an interview with Asia Economy, "We launched Seoul Made with the idea that excellent small and medium-sized enterprise products face export difficulties due to weak brand power," adding, "We plan to support the global market entry of SME products by precisely capturing the values and concepts pursued by the global MZ generation." Photo by Yoon Jin-geun PD

[Asia Economy Reporter Kim Heeyoon] Jang Youngseung, CEO of Seoul Business Agency, recalled, "In 1990, I started Nanum Technology, a system development service company, by renting a 30㎡ office in Seongbuk-dong with four colleagues." Although he briefly worked at a foreign company called Pentasystem before graduation, he felt a crisis in the high salary and comfortable life. After starting his business, he spent every night developing continuously, but founding Nanum Technology was a life challenge for him.

In 1993, Nanum Technology released ‘Ssiat,’ the first Korean software development tool in the country, followed by the ‘Electronic Document Management System’ the next year, which enabled electronic approval of internal company documents. This established Nanum Technology’s reputation as a groupware specialist company. After 10 years of founding, CEO Jang recorded sales of 10 billion KRW and was thriving. However, after acquiring Doremi Records in 2000, the music market declined due to illegal MP3 services, leading him to sell Nanum Technology in 2003 and move to an executive position at a large corporation.

CEO Jang said, "In 2005, I came close to death in a motorcycle accident." Later, after completing a master's degree in Arts Management at Korea National University of Arts in 2011, he challenged cultural projects by producing the film ‘Another Family,’ which dealt with the Samsung leukemia incident, and the play ‘Happy Together,’ themed on the Brothers Home incident. In 2014, he also attracted attention by exhibiting the posthumous sketches of Park Yesul, a Danwon High School student who died in the Sewol ferry disaster.

In 2017, 27 years after his first startup, CEO Jang re-entered entrepreneurship by unveiling the AI character robot ‘Pororo Mini.’ As a lifelong venture entrepreneur, he said, "New solutions and challenges to the impossible have been the driving forces leading me."

CEO Jang, who has more plans to unfold within one year than achievements made in two years of his three-year term, emphasized, "In a domestic startup institution trust survey, despite being a local government agency, Seoul Business Agency ranked second. Through the software education institution ‘Ssak’ and the brand ‘Seoul Made,’ we continuously support the startup ecosystem. My goal is to create an environment where our agency can be number one even after I leave."

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