Ministry of SMEs and Startups Recruiting Companies to Participate in 'Regional Innovation Leading Companies Development' Program

The Ministry of SMEs and Startups announced on the 30th that it is recruiting small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) to participate in the newly established 'Regional Innovation Leading Company Development' (R&D) project this year.

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This project supports technology development to promote the innovative growth of SMEs outside the metropolitan area and to foster balanced regional development. It has been prepared and planned over several years and will be implemented after exemption from preliminary feasibility studies and appropriateness reviews by the Ministry of Science and ICT (MSIT).

While continuing the existing system that supported technological innovation mainly in key industries outside the metropolitan area, the support methods and content have been changed to maximize support outcomes. These changes include designating core items linked to national strategic technologies, introducing competition between regions, focusing on industry-academia-research cooperation, and concentrating on commercialization.

The supported items were designated through cooperation between regional and central governments based on the demand of local companies. This year, 342 items will be announced, and a total of 111 projects will be supported. In previous projects, the budget was distributed almost evenly among regions, but this project will select SMEs developing the items through nationwide competition and provide matching support with national and local funds accordingly.

Additionally, to enable SMEs to collaborate with universities and research institutes, support will focus on consortium-type projects, and to ensure that research and development lead to commercialization and substantial sales and growth, the project will be closely linked with the region-specific project 'Legend 50＋'.

The specific project structure is divided into 'Establishment of Key Industry Ecosystems' targeting industry-academia-research consortia and 'Strengthening Regional Company Capabilities' focusing on individual SMEs. The establishment of key industry ecosystems will support innovative and growth-potential preliminary leading companies by providing up to 1.4 billion KRW over two years to promote collaboration among SMEs within the supply chain and industry-academia cooperation for technological innovation.

Strengthening regional company capabilities will support SMEs with growth potential by enhancing their innovation capabilities to promote their growth into preliminary leading companies, providing up to 400 million KRW over two years.

SMEs operating in key industries with a certain level of sales and an R&D intensity of 1% or more, or those possessing a corporate research institute, are eligible to participate. Companies wishing to participate can apply through the SME Technology Development Project Integrated Management System from February 17 to March 4.

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