• Journal of Korea Trade
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• v.25 no.6
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• pp.78-104
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• 2021

Purpose - Semiconductors are a significant export item for Korea that is expected to continue to contribute significantly to the Korean economy in the future. Thus, the semiconductor industry is a critical component in the 4th Industrial Revolution and is expected to continue growing as the non-face-to-face economy expands as a result of the COVID-19 pandemic. In this context, this paper aims to empirically investigate how semiconductors are imported and exported in Korea from a global supply chain perspective by analysing import and export data at the micro-level. Design/methodology - This study conducts a multifaceted analysis of the global supply chain for semiconductors and related equipment in Korea by examining semiconductor imports and exports by semiconductor type, year, target country, mode of transportation, airport/port, and domestic region, using import/export micro-data. The visualisation, flow analysis, and Bayesian Network methodologies were used to compensate for the limitations of each method. Findings - Korea is a major exporter of semiconductor memory and has the world's highest competitiveness but is relatively weak in the field of system semiconductors. The trade deficit in 'semiconductor equipment and parts' is clearly growing. As a result, continued investment in 'system semiconductors' and 'semiconductor equipment and parts' technology development is necessary to boost exports and ensure a stable supply chain. Originality/value - Few papers on semiconductor trade in Korea have been published from the perspective of the global supply chain or value chain. This study contributes to the literature in this area by focusing on import and export data for the global supply chain of the Korean semiconductor industry using a variety of approaches. It is our hope that the insights gained from this study will aid in the advancement of SCM research.

• Journal of Korea Trade
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• v.26 no.4
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• pp.63-82
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• 2022

Purpose - Drawing on relational institutional theory, we explored how demographic similarity between board members of a firm and newly emerged political elites led to firms' increased financial resource acquisition such as leverage ratio and decreased export intensity amidst the Asian financial crisis. We also studied how a firm's leverage ratio and export intensity can further affect firm profitability and financial credit rating. Design/methodology - We revisited and explored a unique, unprecedented crisis that affected most Korean firms: the Asian financial crisis that coincided with a governmental shift from a conservative to a liberal party. We collected demographic information from 432 listed Korean firms' board members and 43 political elites of the Blue House from 1998-2000 to create a demographic similarity measurement. We collected firms' financial information, built panel data, and used ordinary least squares regression to test our theory. Findings - Our results showed that demographic similarity between a firm's directors and newly emerged politicians had a positive association with a firm's leverage ratio but a negative association with a firm's export intensity. A firm's leverage ratio had a negative relationship with firm performance measured by firm profitability and financial credit rating. A firm's export intensity showed a positive effect on firm performance. Originality/value - We highlighted that during an economic crisis that coincided with a governmental shift and change of leading political actors, firms exerted efforts to survey the environment and build new external stakeholder relationships to cope with the changing landscape. We proposed that in an emerging market like Korea where low levels of trust and favoritism are prevalent across society, one of the relational institutional strategies that firms can employ is the selection of directors with similar demographic characteristics to political elites based on factors including birthplace and school affiliations. We examined the efforts of firms to build political networks with newly empowered political elites during a financial crisis, and the consequences of establishing such networks. We highlighted that during a financial crisis, the demographic similarity between a firm's board members and newly emerged politicians can provide firms with access to financial resources but can also result in poor management and reduced effort to enhance its international competitiveness.

• Korea Trade Review
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• v.42 no.5
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• pp.233-252
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• 2017

The fast changes of global financial environment in recent years increase the risk of trade settlement. This means are required to minimize risk of non payment and to maximize secure payment. Open Account trade accounts for 90% of global trade flows. The O/A system means that the goods, along with all the necessary documents, are shipped and delivered before payment is due, usually within a time frame from 30 to 90 days. Meanwhile, Korean small and medium-sized export enterprises are compelled to globalize their activities owing to limitation and competitiveness of domestic marketplace. To keep face with the global trade settlement system and to support globalization of small and medium-sized export firms, the BPO together with Supply Chain Finance will be solutions. The introduction of the BPO system will allow banks to broaden O/A offerings to their client base and due to secure safety, sellers could ship the goods without delay according to orders and buyers could settle promptly by payment undertaking of correspondent banks. Therefore, it is more effective for companies which have sustainable customers and stable transaction. This study take a look at the trend of the global payment systems and suggested limitation of existed payment in order to derive improvement measures of electronic payment for small and medium-sized export enterprises.

• International Commerce and Information Review
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• v.8 no.2
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• pp.79-98
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• 2006

With shifting the paradigm to digital economy, the digital industry becomes one of the national strategic industries. The digital industry has not only significant effects on forward and backward related industries but is also creating its own value. Furthermore, the effects of conversion with diverse products also play an important role in adding value. Since the early 2000s, Korea's culture so called 'Hallyu' (Korean wave) has been spreading to neighboring Asian countries such as China, Japan, Hong Kong, Therefore we have a good opportunity to increase our competitiveness with the development of the digital content industry using various base resources in conjunction with the spread of Hallyu culture in the Southeast Asian region. In this paper we attempt to suggest several schemes to promote our exports of digital contents while analyzing the current status of the Korean digital industry and addressing some problems and barriers to the export of the digital content industry. There are several schemes to be proposed in order to promote Korean exports of digital contents, as follows: 1) to foster global digital contents, 2) to establish a supporting system, 3) to build a marketing and R&D center, 4) to operate a test-bed of digital contents and 5) to fund expenses such as marketing.

• THE INTERNATIONAL COMMERCE & LAW REVIEW
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• v.22
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• pp.227-254
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• 2004

This paper focuses on the analysis of effects on fisheries sector following Korea-Japan Free Trade Agreement and the results are found as follows. In terms of national competitiveness, the RCA(Revealed comparative advantage) index shows that Korea is higher than Japan in most species items. And the calculation of TSI(Trade Specialization Index) finds that Korea is export specialized while Japan import specialized, showing that Korean fisheries sector is internationally more competitive than Japan. The tariffs on the marine products should be completely scrapped between Korea and Japan, export of marine products to Japan increases a mere 2%, while import from Japan 13.5%. In terms of value, annual export to Japan stands at 20,135thousand USD, while import from Japan at 12,137thousands USD, resulting in trade balance improvement of 8,000thousand USD in total. The tariff measures above is expected to have a positive effect on the related industry of marine products such as Oyster, Conger eel, Ark shells and Laver, but those involved in fisheries of Alaska pollack, Hair tail, Sea-bream(live fish), Red horsehead(frozen), Saury are expected to be negatively affected. Given the results of analysis above, the effects of FTA on the fisheries would be advantageous to Korea as a whole, but at the same time, the advantage and disadvantage sustained differs by fishery type and marine products. To that effect, negotiation strategies and countermeasures should be made, taking the results into account.

• THE INTERNATIONAL COMMERCE & LAW REVIEW
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• v.49
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• pp.189-212
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• 2011

As the international business increases among the nations of the world recently, it is an inevitable fact that its claims rise as well. The most reasons of the international business claims have been concentrated upon the unpaid issues. The other reasons are sequently the different interpretation of business contract's conditions, the inferior quality of the goods, the breach of shipping time, the uncertain market-claims and some problems of transportation, the quantity and bad package of the goods. As business transactions grow more complex, it becomes increasingly important to resolve claims as quickly and efficiently as possible. Recognizing the importance of comprehensive policy support for overall international trade and investment of local company in recent years, Korean government has reborn the Korea Insurance Corporation ("K-sure"). K-sure adopted a range of measures to improve management efficiency to strengthen national competitiveness and national economy by promoting oversea trade and investment. Especially, K-sure will be able cover not only export transactions but also import transactions to secure oversea natural resources and commodities vital the national economy. K-sure should be able to continue and expand the existing export insurance programs, support import transactions and lead export-oriented industrialization of Korea as the best trade insurance agency.

• The Journal of Industrial Distribution & Business
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• v.10 no.9
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• pp.19-24
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• 2019

Purpose - In the digital era, technology advancement enables goods and services to be produced more efficiently but also create economy risk in the global economy including Indonesia. Previous studies stated that the risk can be mitigated through export diversification. This study investigates strategy to expand the markets for existing products and explore the potential market. Research design, data, and methodology - The criteria was followed using a review and considerations combination through the Focus Group Discussion (FGD) to determine the priority product in trading house of Indonesia. This study implemented market share to explore those products' markets and compare it to other ASEAN countries. Results - The Indonesian potential products are T-shirts, singlets and other vests of textile materials, knitted or crocheted (excluding cotton); food preparations; medicaments consisting of mixed or unmixed products for therapeutic or prophylactic purposes; soap in the form of flakes, granules, powder, paste or in aqueous solution; and cocoa powder, not containing added sugar or other sweetening matter. The market analysis also showed that Indonesia still had not optimally accessed yet the largest market in the world for each product. Conclusions - The government should focus more on increasing the competitiveness of those products, particularly in those global marketplaces.

• International Commerce and Information Review
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• v.12 no.4
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• pp.151-170
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• 2010

The present study made an empirical analysis for investigating the competitiveness of technology trades in Korea. In particular, the study deduced the correlation between technology export and technology import using the variables of Gross Domestic Expenditure on R&D and Per capita industry value added Productivity and employed fixed effect model in panel linear regression model. It is found that the R&D expenditure of OECD countries made a significant effect on the technology import and the value-added labor productivity made a significant result on both technology export and import. Therefore, it showed that the technology trade in Korea made a sensitive response to labor productivity in OECD countries. By panel analysis, machine, construction, ICT, and service industry affect most on technology export in Korea for recent 5 years. For technology import, electric-electron, chemical, service, and construction industry have significant effects. This study contributed to understanding of industrial characteristics affecting technology trades in Korea and empirical analysis to show correlation between the factors affecting technology trade.

• Journal of Korean Ophthalmic Optics Society
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• v.11 no.1
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• pp.43-47
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• 2006

Korean eyeglasses export has continuously decreased at the annual average rate of 10% since year 2000. On the other hand, China - the number 1 competing country - is chasing after Korea while accomplishing average 20% of export increase per annum after year 2000. Considering these factors, main cause of stagnation in domestic eyeglasses industry can be seen as China's pursuit propelled by their low labor costs as well as investment on Research &Development. Other important causes are insufficient investment on R &D, decrease in competitiveness due to increase of import, deficiency of exploitative ability on own brand and own design, lack of infrastructure in eyeglasses expo, and etc.

• The Research Journal of the Costume Culture
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• v.27 no.3
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• pp.251-263
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• 2019

As the spread of the health and wellness trend continues worldwide, many consumers are spending much time on sports activities and expressing their individuality through sportswear. This study analyzes the trade networks of major exporters and importers of athleisure wear to provide an exporting policy for Korean apparel companies. As a result, The USA was found to import the most athleisure wear. On the other hand, China had the largest number of athleisure wear exports, and India's exports, which are becoming increasingly important as apparel producers were notable. Next, using the concept of the centrality of social network analysis, it was found that the USA was the largest importer and the center of athleisure wear's export network, but its influence has decreased gradually since 2010. China has the highest out-degree and betweenness centrality and center in the export of athleisure wear. The centrality of Asian countries such as India and Vietnam has increased. In Korea, the import of athleisure wear has increased greatly, but the export of athleisure wear has continuously decreased. Korea has less price competitiveness than other developing countries in Asia, but many Korean athleisure wear clothing brands are now attracting popularity not only in Korea but also in other countries with their excellent technology and design. In the future, the exporting policy of Korea's athleisure wear should focus on high value-added and differentiated products.