It is vital that the domestic IT industry wins recognition for its technology in the domestic market since the domestic market has long distrusted domestic technology.
Instead, the preference by domestic consumers has been for foreign technology and ignoring the local counterpart, no matter how remarkable. Developing source technology will serve to stimulate the domestic market, but for this to happen government assistance is necessary now more than ever.
The government should support domestic source technology as a form of national policy. Tax cuts and other benefits should be granted to domestic enterprises introducing homegrown technology, industry observers say.
To successfully enter overseas markets, it is imperative that there be tight cooperation among technology holding company, device manufacturers, service operators and contents providers. Above all, developing source technology should be a joint project between industry, universities and research institutes.
The government and industry should join hands to encourage technology development and create an environment where venture start-ups can develop source technology. In this way, the Korean IT industry will be able to withstand the welter of foreign technology flooding the market and help it regain its competitive edge.
Contribution : Ko Hyun jin , President and CEO of Korea IT Industry Promotion Agency (KIDA)
No Core Technologies, No Achievement of the US$20,000 GDP Per Capita Goal
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Korea's top five export products include three IT products, i.e., computers, mobile phones and semiconductor products. Even though the gross sales of the domestic IT industries are growing rapidly, they cannot claim to have source technologies. The major IT industries pay huge amounts in royalties to overseas companies. According to a survey, most of these royalties are paid to such companies as IBM and Microsoft that possess advanced technologies in software field.
Korea has repeatedly failed to achieve its goal of US$20,000 GDP per capita. In this connection, software industry source technologies outrank any others in importance.
In this age of knowledge and information, the country possessing source technologies in software, the key fundamental technology, will occupy the most advantageous position in the global marketplace.
Korea must do everything possible to acquire software source technologies. Fortunately, Korea's excellent IT infrastructure including wireless and wired networks and the IT839 strategy driven by the Ministry of Information and Communication together with the emerging market is providing opportunities to secure software source technologies.
Governmental organizations are now carefully considering adopting open source software, which seems to have resulted from a realization of the importance of source technology. Thus these public organizations are becoming part of the effort to form an early source technology market.
Linux, the best-known open source software, is used worldwide. In addition, the technological verification of the platform is already completed. Linux is a new type of IT technology, the adoption of which is just beginning in Korea where the realization of economies of scale is paramount.
Open source software is not a passing fad. It is the only realistic means to secure source technology and to achieve the goal of a $20,000 per capita GDP.
Now is the time to build a framework to access and disseminate open source software. In the short run, this strategy might not produce visible results, but cooperative efforts by the government and software business circles are vital to the creation of renewed competitiveness in the Korean IT industries.
