Seeking Future Food Sources... Financial Companies Investing in In-House Ventures (Comprehensive)

Successful Experiments of In-House Ventures Reflecting Young Ideas
Woori Financial, First Holding Company to Spin Off Two In-House Venture Teams as Independent Firms
Shinhan, IBK, and Others Also Operate In-House Venture Development Programs

Son Tae-seung (third from the left in the first row), Chairman of Woori Financial Group, and the management team held the final business presentation on June 29 at the Woori Financial Group headquarters located in Hoehyeon-dong, Jung-gu, Seoul, and took a commemorative photo with the in-house venture employees of Woori Bank and Woori FIS, which are spinning off as independent companies.

[Asia Economy Reporter Jin-ho Kim] Financial companies' efforts to find the ‘future food source’ have begun to bear fruit. Internal venture experiments that reflect young and fresh ideas into business are gradually achieving success. As the speed of digital transformation accelerates day by day, financial companies are also analyzed as a result of the urgent need to ‘change to survive,’ just like IT companies. The bold attempts by financial companies to foster internal ventures are expected to accelerate further.

According to the financial sector on the 6th, Woori Financial Group recently spun off the first internal venture team selected through its internal venture fostering program, ‘Woori Adventure,’ into an independent company. This is the first case among domestic financial holding companies.

Woori Adventure refers to a daring venture group that challenges with free and innovative ideas regardless of the field, from analog to digital. About 50 teams were selected, and through three rounds of evaluation, two teams were chosen and intensively nurtured over the past 10 months.

The internal venture teams spun off as independent companies are Woori Bank’s ‘WooriTem’ and Woori FIS’s ‘Midgo Matkyeo.’ ‘WooriTem’ launches a ‘P2P rental service’ where individuals can lend items such as cameras and professional equipment to each other, and ‘Midgo Matkyeo’ offers a ‘storage service’ that stores and manages personal items like seasonal clothing collections.

The spin-off of these internal venture teams into independent companies is the first tangible result of Chairman Sohn Tae-seung’s will to instill ‘innovation DNA’ in group employees. To break away from the financial sector’s typically conservative organizational culture and risk-averse work style, Woori Financial also granted them ‘back options.’ They can return to their original company at any time within three years, and all their career experience will be recognized. This means they should boldly focus on new business development without worrying about failure.

Hana Financial Group has maintained three teams under Hana Financial TI as independent spin-offs since starting its internal venture system in 2018. Hana Bank has also dispatched employees to companies participating in the startup fostering program ‘OneQ Agile Lab.’

Shinhan Bank plans to resume ‘S-Park’ from the 7th of this month. S-Park is an internal venture system that collects ideas from employees and supports their commercialization. This year, a special program will be operated for the top three teams among the submitted ideas. The three teams selected in October will participate in projects developing core programs or products with external professional developers, while being excluded from their existing duties.

IBK Industrial Bank also has an internal venture program. IBK’s COP (Community of Practice) is a system where employees interested in the same topic exchange information and experiences related to that topic, creating and sharing knowledge within the organization. ‘IBK Bobae,’ which designs business models to support small and medium-sized enterprises, is currently in operation.

Shinhan Card was the first in the card industry to spin off ‘CV3,’ nurtured through the internal venture fostering program ‘I’m Ventures,’ into an independent corporation. ‘CV3’ operates the shopping information subscription platform app ‘Before Shopping.’

The reason financial companies are strengthening internal venture experiments one after another is interpreted as reflecting the sense of crisis that ‘if you don’t change, you die.’ To overcome fierce challenges from big tech (large information and communication companies) and fintech (finance + technology), discovering new businesses in response is urgent. A banking sector official said, "There is growing support for actively fostering internal ventures like IT companies to break the conservative culture and achieve innovation," adding, "Attention is being paid to the fact that a well-developed internal venture can become a future growth engine."

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