Promotion of Technology-based Start-ups: TIPS Policy of Korea

The key conditions for the promotion of innovative technology-based start-ups are expanding the market for innovative technology products and services, increasing equity-based funding opportunities, promoting the commercialization of technological innovation, and establishing a fair-trade system for start-ups to compete fairly in the market. Besides, there is a need for a support system that minimizes the cost of failure in case of business failure to facilitate re-challenge and provides education and training opportunities to enhance entrepreneurial capabilities. To activate technology-based start-ups, the Korean government introduced the TIPS policy in 2013. It is a program that creates technology start-up with private investment led by successful venture entrepreneurs, which has shown remarkable achievement and is regarded as the most successful policy in this field up to now. The most critical factor contributed to the success of this program is to invite private investors to select a technology entrepreneurship team and provide mentoring with the investment. The government provides R&D funding with matching investment, commercialization and marketing support to ensure that technology start-ups survive crossing the death-valley. Subsequent investments from domestic and abroad investors are actively made and it is becoming a representative technology-based start-up program in Korea.