The Four-Character Idiom for 2025 Chosen by the Small and Medium Business Community: 'Innae Oeyang (忍耐外揚)'

"Overcoming Difficulties by Exercising Patience"

The Korea Federation of SMEs announced on the 22nd that it selected ‘Innae Waeyang (忍耐外揚)’ as the four-character idiom representing the outlook for small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) in 2025, based on the results of a survey titled ‘SME Management Environment Outlook Interpreted Through Four-Character Idioms’ conducted with 500 SMEs (36.4%).

Since 2014, the Federation has announced the four-character idiom of the year annually. This year, in line with the trend of digital transformation, it broadly collected candidate idioms using the AI ChatGPT.

‘Innae Waeyang (忍耐外揚)’ is a newly generated four-character idiom by ChatGPT, meaning ‘to overcome difficulties by exercising patience.’ It is interpreted as expressing the determination of SME owners to endure and overcome the complex domestic and international economic crises they faced throughout the year with patience.

According to the Federation’s survey, the most common response for strategies to cope with next year’s business environment was ‘diversification of clients and strengthening cooperation between companies’ at 50.4%, followed by productivity innovation such as technology development (41.2%) and strengthening marketing strategies (29.6%).

The most needed support for improving next year’s business environment was ‘market expansion’ at 35.2%. This was followed by technology development support such as R&D investment (30.6%), measures to address high interest rates (28.0%), and regulatory improvements (26.0%).

Meanwhile, the four-character idiom representing this year’s business environment was ‘Hwannan Sangchul (患難相恤),’ meaning ‘overcoming difficult situations through sharing and compassion.’

Kim Gi-moon, Chairman of the Korea Federation of SMEs, said, “The idiom Innae Waeyang chosen by SME owners embodies the firm determination of 8.04 million SMEs to patiently endure and overcome ongoing challenges such as domestic demand stagnation and the spread of protectionist trade policies. Although these are turbulent times both domestically and internationally, the SME sector will calmly carry out business operations and production activities to contribute to stabilizing people’s livelihoods and creating jobs.”

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