2020 Man of Merit Awards for Venture Startups Promotion – Selcos CEO Baek Woo-sung Receives the Gold Tower Order of Industrial Service Merit

Reported at 17:30 on Dec. 15, 2020

The Ministry of SMEs and Startups (MSS) held an awards ceremony for individuals and organizations that have contributed to Korea’s venture startup ecosystem development in EL Tower in Yangjae-dong, Seoul on the 15^th of December.  

The awards ceremony, held annually since it was launched in 1999, is an event rewarding men of merit who have contributed to the development, innovation, and growth of the venture industry. By maintaining the Gold Tower Order of Industrial Service Merit, the grand prize, for three years consecutively, the awards have encouraged the men of merit in the SME field.

The total number of prizes awarded is 164: 2 orders, 3 awards, 17 Presidential citations, 17 Prime Minister’s citations, and 125 MSS Minister’s citations. 

The grand prize, The Gold Tower Order of Industrial Service Merit, was awarded to Selcos CEO Baek Sung-woo, and the Silver Tower Order of Industrial Service Merit was awarded to Caregen CEO Chung Yong-ji. Mediana CEO Gil Mun-jong, Withtech CEO Yu Seung-gyo, and DSC Investment CEO Yun Geon-soo won the Industrial awards, respectively.  

Selcos CEO Baek, who developed a new method for the world’s first environmentally-friendly surface treatment, has contributed to national competitiveness consolidation and domestic and international industrial development. He has led the way in creating a stable employment environment with initiatives such as the employment of all full time workers (no part time workers) and a women-friendly workplace culture. Taking all of this into consideration, he won the gold tower order.

The Caregen CEO Chung, who received the silver tower order due to exporting over 90% of total sales to 130 countries and his company’s contribution to national economic development and global competitiveness consolidation, based on world top technological capabilities in the peptide R&D sector. Mediana CEO Gil won the industrial award thanks to their success in developing a domestic medical patients monitoring device and achieving top place in the Korean market based on bio signal measurement’s original technology. Withtech CEO Yu was awarded the award due to his contribution to environmental protection and industrial competitiveness improvement through pollution source monitoring technology development for the semiconductor and display industries. DSC Investment CEO Yun received the award thanks to his commitment to intensively investing over 60% of the total investment amount to early stage startups as a venture capital company specializing in early stage investment.

Starting with a video showing the achievements of venture businesses and startups and delivering messages to encourage them by an a cappella performance team on the day, SMEs and Startups Minister Park Young-sun awarded the orders and prizes in the order of the Prime Minister’s Citations, Presidential Citations, and Orders and Awards. 31 out of 39 awardees of the governmental awards, including venture businesses, startups, and investment capitals received the awards at the ceremony site. The other 8 awardees, their families, and company colleagues attended the contactless ceremony online.

Park Young-sun, SMEs and Startups Minister remarked, “Although the year 2020 was full of crises such as an economic downturn due to COVID-19, venture businesses have increased jobs by 27,000 for the year since June last year. More than 10,000 jobs were created in the first half of this year and so the startups stood at 343,000 in the Q3 this year, up 13.3% year on year. Actually our venture businesses and startups are the prop of our economy.”  

She added, “As a result of an analysis of venture businesses and unicorn companies in the Korean stock markets, only 6 venture businesses were placed in the top 20 in terms of market value in 2000. But they increased to 13 now, and the total market value of those 13 venture businesses is KRW 45 trillion, taking up 12.4% of the total KOSDAQ market value of KRW 359 trillion. Through this, we can confirm that Korean venture businesses and unicorn companies are rising stars in the stock market, and the venture business ecosystem, namely a virtuous circle structure such as startup-growth-unicorn-collection (IPO) is being shaped.” The Minister requested, “I hope all of you will become main players, leading our economy’s leap forward amid crisis, as you have earnestly shown your passion in the front line of industrial sites with innovative technologies and ideas whenever the Korean economy faces ordeals.”

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