"Support for Regional Investment in Korean New Deal Fund" MOIS and FSC Host Honam Region Balanced New Deal IR

Minister Jeon Hae-cheol's Third Regional Balanced New Deal Initiative... On-site Visit to Jeonbuk-type New Deal

[Image source=Yonhap News]

[Asia Economy Reporter Lim Cheol-young] The Ministry of the Interior and Safety and the Financial Services Commission jointly held the ‘Honam Region On-site Regional Balanced New Deal Investment Briefing (IR)’ on the 2nd at the Jeonju Chamber of Commerce and Industry in Jeollabuk-do, together with Gwangju Metropolitan City, Jeollabuk-do, Jeollanam-do, and Jeju Special Self-Governing Province.

The investment briefing was attended both online and offline by entrusted operators of government-led funds, including 26 Korean New Deal funds selected last May, and four regional balanced New Deal companies from the Honam region.

The Ministry of the Interior and Safety and the Financial Services Commission plan to hold regional touring investment briefings by area, starting with the Honam region, followed by Yeongnam, the metropolitan area, and Chungcheong region. This regional touring briefing was planned to support entrusted operators of government-led funds such as the Korean New Deal funds in smoothly discovering investment targets, and to provide private funds including Korean New Deal funds to excellent regional balanced New Deal companies and projects facing difficulties in business expansion and R&D due to lack of funds.

HB Investment, an entrusted operator of the Korean New Deal fund, explained the investment directions and conditions of the funds to be operated in the future. Inlight Ventures, which has formed and is operating regional funds such as the Yeong-Honam Regional Balanced Development Special Zone Fund, Ocean Star Fund, and Next Unicorn Venture Fund, introduced cases of forming regional funds and investing in venture companies.

Representative New Deal companies in the Honam region also introduced their corporate status and ongoing projects to attract investment. Gaoncell from Jeollabuk-do is a specialized company in hydrogen fuel cells and hydrogen fuel cell systems, selected as an excellent R&D innovative product by the Ministry of Trade, Industry and Energy this year, and hopes to attract investment to expand its hydrogen fuel cell system manufacturing and sales business. SMR from Jeollanam-do is one of the nine power companies participating in the Sinan 8.2GW offshore wind power complex project, a core regional balanced New Deal project in Jeonnam, and is promoting a 2200MW scale power complex as a resident profit-sharing type project.

Minister Jeon Hae-cheol, who attended the briefing, emphasized, “The core of this year’s regional balanced New Deal is financial support for creative regional projects,” and stated, “While promoting national funding support for excellent projects, we will actively support the investment of the 4 trillion won scale Korean New Deal fund in the regions through regional touring investment briefings.” The government is additionally creating a 50 billion won scale policy fund by selecting two ad-hoc operators to enable the Korean New Deal fund to invest more in regional balanced New Deal projects and companies.

After the briefing, Minister Jeon visited Iljin Highsolus, one of the core partner companies of the Jeonbuk-type New Deal, toured the factory facilities, and listened to difficulties. Iljin Highsolus is a mid-sized company that mass-produced the world’s first hydrogen tanks for passenger cars and produces hydrogen storage tanks for Hyundai Motor’s Nexo and hydrogen electric buses. It is also participating as an implementing agency in Jeollabuk-do’s ‘Carbon Composite Large-capacity Hydrogen Transport System Demonstration Project.’

Minister Jeon said, “Wanju is a key area where the entire cycle infrastructure related to hydrogen production-storage-transport-utilization-research is being established,” and urged, “Please continue research and development to become a region leading innovation.” He added, “The Ministry of the Interior and Safety will also continue administrative and financial support such as securing national funds, simplifying local financial investment reviews, and regulatory reforms so that local governments can actively promote the hydrogen industry and renewable energy industry.”

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