'Kyeongpyeong D Grade' Korea Information and Communication Industry Promotion Agency Seeks New Head

Term of Director Kim Chang-yong Ends in October
Appointment Committee Formed... Minister of Science and ICT Appointed Position

[Asia Economy Reporter Minyoung Cha] The National IT Industry Promotion Agency (NIPA), which received a ‘D’ grade warning from the head of the institution in last year’s public institution management evaluation, is searching for a new leader.

According to industry sources on the 2nd, NIPA has formed an executive recommendation committee and launched a recruitment process for a new president ahead of the expiration of Kim Chang-yong’s term in October. The NIPA president, who serves a three-year term, must go through the recommendation and screening by the executive recommendation committee and be appointed by the Minister of Science and ICT.

President Kim, a private-sector appointee who previously served as an advisor to Samsung Electronics, raised expectations at the time of his appointment, but the actual management evaluation was not favorable. In June this year, NIPA received a D grade, the fourth out of five grades for underperforming institutions, in the Ministry of Economy and Finance’s ‘2020 Public Institution Management Performance Evaluation.’ This was a drop from the C grade in 2019.

As one of Korea’s leading ICT public institutions, NIPA has consistently remained in the lower ranks in management evaluations for several years. It received A to B grades in 2011?2012 but fell to a C grade in 2014 and has since remained between B and C grades. However, dropping to a D grade is considered unusual. Recently, NIPA also commissioned an external consulting service worth 50 million KRW to improve management.

A NIPA official explained, "The recruitment for the president is proceeding normally as the term is about to expire and is not related to the management evaluation results," adding, "This is not the first time we have conducted external consulting services for organizational improvement."

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