11/27/2013

Opening Ceremony of the 2013 Entrepreneurship Week and the International Conference

The Korea Chamber of Commerce and Industry (Chairman Park, Yongmaan), together with the Ministry of Trade, Industry and Energy, Small and Medium Business Administration, Small and Medium Business Corporation, KOTRA, and Woori Bank, jointly hosted the ‘2013 Entrepreneurship Week.’ It started with the opening ceremony on October 28, 2013 at the KCCI International Conference Hall and lasted for four days. 

The Entrepreneurship Week was launched in 2008, when the global financial crisis erupted, with the initial aim to find the answer to overcome crisis in the spirit of entrepreneurship. The slogan for the 6th Entrepreneurship Week of 2013 was ‘Entrepreneurialism: the cornerstone of creative economy,’ and it provided various events such as the International Conference, Foreign CSR Commercialization Forum, SMEs Re-challenge Forum, and Information Session on how to encourage youths’ establishment of their own businesses.

Around 400 personnel attended the opening ceremony, including the KCCI Chairman Park, Yongmaan, the Minister of Trade, Industry and Energy Yoon, Sang-jik, the Samsung Social Volunteer Committee President Seo, Joon-hee, and the LG Group Vice-president Kim, Young-gi. All participants reaffirmed their commitment to realize creative economy through the recovery of entrepreneurial spirit.

Through his opening speech, the KCCI Chairman Park, Yongmaan said that “the Republic of Korea, which was one of the world’s poorest nations half a century ago, has grown to become one of the world’s top 10 economic powers. This was possible due to the businessmen’s challenging and passionate entrepreneurialism, which created something out of nothing, and made possible the impossible.”

Also, “Korea’s entrepreneurialism was presented with a challenge with the financial crisis in 1997 and also in 2008, and the already saturated and oversupplied market and the limitless global competition pushed Korea’s entrepreneurialism further, causing Korea’s people to renovate themselves as well as its entrepreneurialism to rearm itself.”

Chairman Park stated that “a transparent and correct management is the demand of the current time, and embracing and leading innovation is the way to open the doors to a better future.” Further, he emphasized that “fostering and developing working talented labor force will help highlight entrepreneurialism, which will in turn strengthen national competitiveness,” and that “when all the people stand in the shoes of our previous generation, who have worked endlessly with passion, their entrepreneurialism will create a new future.”

In addition, “as all nations are putting forth diverse efforts to inspire entrepreneurialism, Korea must also install new entrepreneurial spirit on top of the inherited entrepreneurial DNA passed on to us by the previous generation of businessmen.”

Chairman Park concluded by stating that “individuals must endlessly transform and renovate themselves, sharpening one’s perception of the world as well as one’s insight of the future and further challenging themselves with new challenges. The society, on the other hand, must create an environment where the youths can spread their wings of hope for the future and passion for new challenges.”

Minister of Trade, Industry and Energy Yoon, Sang-jik stated that “the key to creative economy is a challenging entrepreneurship.” He requested for “more effort towards the expansion of shared growth and the establishment of a fair order for market transactions, for a more cooperative ecosystem for the Korean companies.”

A video of the history of entrepreneurialism of the previous generation of businessmen attracted much interest. It started with Chairmen Lee, Byung-cheol and Chairman Jung, Joo-young, whose ironclad entrepreneurships brought about the ‘Miracle of the Han River,’ and the video showed how the Korean economy faced the foreign exchange crisis and the global financial crisis.

With the end of the video, an event for the recovery of entrepreneurialism was unfolded. The KCCI Chairman Park, Yongmaan, the Minister of Trade, Industry and Energy Yoon, Sang-jik, and other businessmen came up to the stage with university students who are members of venture clubs to put together a jigsaw puzzle and they reaffirmed their commitment to recover entrepreneurialism.

At the International Conference that followed, world scholars participated and presented on a creative and innovative entrepreneurialism. The author of ‘Getting More’ and a professor at Wharton School, Stuart Diamond, stated that “the key to entrepreneurialism is the basic interaction between people; meaning, the interest and attention to communication.”

The author of ‘Hidden in Plain Sight’ and the Executive Creative Director of Global Insights at Frog Design, Jan Chipchase, presented on how to sharpen your insight that will capture an opportunity for a new business with a true understanding of the actions of people. Jan Chipchase has more than 30 patents in the US and Europe, and was featured in Fortune magazine as one of top 50 most prominent persons in technology in 2010.

Not only that, CEO of Korea Global Entrepreneurialism Research Center, Ban, Sung-shik, presented on ‘the current status of Korea’s entrepreneurialism in comparison to the international world,’ while CEO of Tide Institute Go, San, and CEO of Treeplanet Kim, Hyung-soo presented on ‘the passion and creative challenges of youth entrepreneurs.’

No comments:

Post a Comment