Ministry of SMEs and Startups Announces First Notice for 2025 SME Innovation Voucher Support Program

Support Targets for Serious Accident Prevention Vouchers
Expanded Application from Small to Medium Enterprises

On the 7th, the Ministry of SMEs and Startups announced the first public notice for participating companies in 2025 for the "SME Innovation Voucher" project, which provides bundled (package) support including consulting, technical support, and marketing to strengthen the competitiveness of manufacturing SMEs.

The SME Innovation Voucher project is divided into five types according to the characteristics and needs of companies (General, Carbon Neutrality, Regional Growth, Serious Accident Prevention, and Recovery Consulting), and supports three services (consulting, technical support, marketing) tailored to each type of company through a voucher system.

This first public notice is conducted for four types excluding the ‘Regional Growth’ type, aiming to strengthen the innovation capabilities of SMEs and help SMEs in management crises to recover.

The support budget for 2025 is 61.4 billion KRW (government proposal basis), an increase of 5.6 billion KRW compared to this year (55.8 billion KRW), targeting more than 2,600 voucher supports. Companies selected for the Innovation Voucher project will be provided vouchers up to a limit of 50 million KRW.

The eligible recipients of this project are manufacturing small and medium enterprises with sales of 12 billion KRW or less, and even if they have previously received voucher services, they can apply for this call as long as they have not exceeded three times within five years.

The SME Innovation Voucher project for next year will have the following changes compared to this year.

First, the scope of support for the Serious Accident Prevention Voucher will be expanded. Considering the continuous increase in industrial accidents in SMEs, the support target, which was limited to SMEs with fewer than 50 employees this year, has been expanded to all manufacturing SMEs to proactively respond to the Serious Accident Punishment Act.

An artificial intelligence (AI)-based evaluation model will be pilot introduced. To enhance the objectivity of evaluations for Innovation Voucher applicant companies and improve project performance, the AI-based evaluation model will be used as a reference when selecting beneficiary companies.

Information provision on executing agencies will also be strengthened. The information provision function of the ‘Innovation Voucher Platform’ will be enhanced to make it easier to search and compare information about executing agencies (providing consulting, technical support, and marketing services).

Minister Oh Young-joo stated, “Excellent local SMEs are facing difficulties due to a lack of resources and expertise in various fields such as technology development, design, and marketing,” and added, “Through the Innovation Voucher project, we will resolve these issues and support the management innovation and smooth recovery of manufacturing SMEs, which are the foundation of the regional economy.”

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