Cha Sun-do, Director of the Korea Health Industry Development Institute, "Will Illuminate the Future of the Bio·Health Industry"

2024 New Year's Address

Cha Sun-do, President of the Korea Health Industry Development Institute (KHIDI), expressed his New Year's resolution, stating that "the role of the Development Institute will grow even larger" and "we will illuminate the future of the bio-health industry."

Cha Sun-do, President of the Korea Health Industry Development Institute
[Photo by Korea Health Industry Development Institute]

In his New Year's address on the 1st, President Cha reflected, "We had a busy year keeping pace with the government's national direction to foster the bio-health industry," and added, "We supported the establishment of various government health industry promotion policies and strategies, and worked hard to plan and secure budgets for large-scale research and development (R&D) projects such as the National Integrated Bio Big Data Construction Project, the Korean-style ARPA-H Project, and the Boston-Korea Project."

President Cha, who revealed that "the healthcare R&D budget managed by the Development Institute this year is 818 billion KRW, approaching the era of a 1 trillion KRW budget," stated, "There are external demands to centralize basic and applied healthcare R&D around the Development Institute, indicating that the Institute's role will become even larger and more important in the future," and set this year's key tasks as ▲supporting the successful soft-landing of large-scale advanced bio R&D ▲strengthening policy support functions ▲creating an innovation ecosystem.

First, to support the successful soft-landing of large-scale advanced bio R&D projects, he said the Institute will provide wholehearted support for ▲the National Integrated Bio Big Data Construction Project, which will lay the foundation for precision medicine ▲advanced bio R&D global collaborative research such as the Korean-style ARPA-H Project, a mission-oriented R&D support system to solve healthcare challenges ▲and the Boston-Korea Project, which will lead physician-scientist joint research, emphasizing, "Starting this year, we will fully support the successful launch of R&D projects carried out by the Development Institute."

Next, to support the fostering of the bio-health industry, he emphasized that the Institute will strengthen its policy support functions by discovering policy issues, proposing agendas, and establishing innovation strategies across various fields including research and development (R&D), regulatory innovation, and talent cultivation. He also mentioned plans to promote policy development for medical innovation in the digital healthcare era.

Third, he explained, "We will strive to create an innovation ecosystem including startups and investments so that bio-health products such as pharmaceuticals, medical devices, and cosmetics can grow into Korea's main export items," adding, "We will firmly establish the 'Medical Korea' brand by promoting the excellence of Korean healthcare worldwide and continuously expand the global reach of excellent medical services through increased training of foreign medical professionals and overseas expansion of medical institutions."

President Cha concluded, "In 2024, the Development Institute will do its best to successfully address the challenges facing our bio-health industry," and said, "Based on the values of ‘expertise’ held by our executives and staff and the ‘autonomy’ to create change and innovation on our own, we will illuminate the future of the bio-health industry."

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