20 Regional Universities Unite as Innovation Hub... 'Busan-style RISE' Project Sets Sail

The Busan-style RISE (Regional Innovation System for Education) project, in which all universities in the Busan area and local governments carry out innovation projects for regional development, has set sail.

On the 10th, the Busan Metropolitan Government (Mayor Park Hyungjoon) announced that it had selected local universities and projects to strengthen the innovation capabilities of regional universities and to serve as a hub for regional development in order to leap forward as a 'global hub city'.

Through the deliberation of the Busan-style Regional Innovation-Centered University Support System (RISE) Project Selection Evaluation Committee and the Busan RISE Committee, 20 local universities and 122 projects were selected.

For the first year of the project, the Busan-style RISE project will invest 134.1 billion KRW in four major projects and twelve core tasks. From 2025 to 2029, based on the Busan Development Plan, it will promote university specialization closely linked to regional industries.

The vision of this project is set as 'Busan-style RISE that creates a new innovation wave (New Wave) for the 2030 global hub city.' It consists of four major projects and twelve core tasks: ▲ Human Wave for securing future talent ▲ Industrial Wave for industrial advancement ▲ Social Wave for spreading regional values ▲ University Wave for university transformation.

With the 20 selected universities, Busan plans to link the government's RISE performance indicators over the next five years until 2029 and pursue outcome-oriented projects that companies can feel, such as ▲ improving the local employment retention rate by 15% through nurturing talent tailored to local industries ▲ increasing collaboration performance by 10% through the establishment of geo-industry-academia-research clusters ▲ boosting university-led startup rates by 20% through the Busan-style university startup package. The city aims to build a sustainable regional innovation growth foundation where future technology and talent circulate in a virtuous cycle.

The evaluation related to this selection was entrusted to the Busan RISE Innovation Institute, a specialized organization. The Selection Evaluation Committee was composed and operated with experts from academia, research, and industry to ensure fairness and expertise, and conducted both document and face-to-face reviews through a five-day retreat.

The evaluation covered universities' innovation and specialization strategies, whether plans were established based on regional characteristics and industrial demand, the implementation strategy for the Busan-style RISE representative model 'Open UIC (University-Industry Collaboration)' based on industrial clusters, the specificity and feasibility of plans to create tangible outcomes centered on stakeholders (such as student employment/startups and companies), and the effectiveness of financial investment plans.

Prior to the main evaluation, Busan reviewed and evaluated preliminary proposals from each university through a preliminary review from January to February, requesting supplementation for selection and concentration based on specialization, as well as specificity and feasibility of project content. As a result, the main evaluation proposals reflected and supplemented the preliminary review comments relatively well.

The selected projects are composed of region-centered tasks in line with the purpose of the RISE project, such as ▲ establishing university specialization strategies based on regional characteristics and industrial demand ▲ specifying project content through corporate demand surveys, analysis, and cooperation system building such as business agreements ▲ local retention measures such as linking local companies with employment and promoting university-led startups ▲ building an innovation ecosystem based on regional industrial clusters.

The results of the university selection will be notified to each university on the 10th. After an objection period (April 10-17), the final selection will be confirmed. Universities will be required to submit revised plans reflecting feedback from the project plan evaluation by the end of April, after which project agreements will be signed with the 20 universities at the end of April, and the RISE project will be fully launched in May.

Kim Guiok, Director of Youth-Industry-Academia Affairs at Busan Metropolitan Government, said, "This year marks the first year of the RISE project led by the city, and we have worked hard for the successful implementation of the project through a two-year pilot period," adding, "We will devote our efforts to establishing a successful model of Busan-style RISE together with universities, companies, and other regional innovation stakeholders."

Busan City Hall.

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