Korea has the best IT infrastructure in the world. More than 70 percent of the population subscribes to high speed internet and more than 42 million people are mobile phone users. The Internet infrastructure growth rate is significantly high in Korea, which makes it the best condition to build complexes with the latest in Information technology.
This infrastructure couldn't have been built without software. In the end, it's the software embedded mobile phones or cars that makes the products stand out and sell, not the product itself. Software increases the value of almost every product and increases the job opportunities in content businesses.
In spite of software's hidden contribution to digital Korea, however, the software is a little less than 2% of the country's economy due to the dependence on foreign software corporation. A policy needs to be checked for fair competition, a mood needs to be set to support small and medium sized companies with potential, and support is needed for domestic products to reach overseas. Who can take charge in the front line regarding these needs The Korea Software Industry Promotion Agency (KIPA) is one of a few institutes that has been established to solve the problem.
As the chief software caretaker, one of the first things KIPA started to do was running tests to compare domestic software and foreign software. When domestic software comes out to be as competitive as foreign software, KIPA suggests that government institutions use local software rather than foreign ones. This are called leading small and medium sized software.
Six new software models were recently chosen to run a test of the new version of the software with several companies. KIPA fully supports companies who take proposals to try out new software, and this test has been running for three years now. This process has been gradually changing people's negative attitudes about trying new software. Targeting the entire population to try out new software might not be successful, but KIPA's strategy is highly influential in the software industry.
KIPA's undying support to develop the domestic software industry by improving software quality and by creating sales opportunities for good software products is paying off and increasing the distribution rate of domestic software. KIPA's primary goal is to expand the market by making application models. In order to do so, marketing skill is required. Not only does KIPA serve as a matchmaker, but it also serves as a trainer and a consultant. When a company seeks out a payroll management system, KIPA offers customized software like logistics controlling system or inventory managing software to meet their further needs. KIPA also focuses on training software experts to improve the quality of software products and the project process of information systems in the public sector. The customized training programs are to produce promising software models.
The Capability Maturity Model rates the models from level 1 to level 5. The software that receives lower than level 3, the standard, is not allowed to be distributed. In order to give a fair chance to all companies, KIPA educates or trains the companies to create software above the standard level. Moreover, KIPA conducts business matchmaking between companies and buyers, and provides marketing education for engineers.
Once KIPA sets the mood and policy, KIPA gets busier by supporting the companies to export the product overseas. Big firms get their own distributors as they go abroad, but the small and medium sized companies struggle to find faithful distributors. KIPA counsels those companies with a potential to use the Global Service Platform. One of the platforms is set in central Seoul for the companies to apply only if the company has potential. A gaming company, Joymax, is the one of the companies who took full advantage of this counseling and succeeded in the global market.
The Korea Software Industry Promotion Agency (KIPA) strengthens software company competitiveness through marketing and consulting in the belief that one successful hit will benefit the other sectors of an industry.
