The city of Incheon has joined hands with Hana Bank, Hana Securities and the Korea Technology Finance Corporation (KIBO) to sign three business agreements covering local small merchants, promising companies and ordinary residents. The plan aims to build a ‘virtuous-cycle shared growth’ structure that goes beyond short-term funding, simultaneously targeting a global leap for local firms and improvements in residents’ daily lives.
 [코리안투데이] Signing of the shared-growth business agreement between Incheon and Hana Bank, Hana Securities and KIBO © 장형임 기자 |
The Incheon Metropolitan Government (Mayor Park Chan-dae) announced on the 14th that it had signed three business agreements with Hana Bank, Hana Securities and KIBO to support people’s livelihoods and cultivate future growth engines.
The agreements are not limited to short-term funding for local small merchants and small and medium-sized enterprises struggling with high prices and high interest rates. Rather, they were pursued to create momentum for Incheon’s promising companies to rise to world-class levels, while the local community and residents share in the benefits together. The agreements consist of three core tasks: creating a ‘unicorn fund’ to scale up innovative growth companies; providing customized technology guarantees for future growth engines (ABC+E); and delivering ‘shared growth support’ in which local banks and residents take part together.
The first task, the ‘unicorn fund,’ is a 200 billion won fund that concentrates investment in promising companies with high growth potential in Incheon’s key new-growth sectors. Operated by reinvesting in various funds that in turn invest in promising Incheon companies, the money actually channeled into Incheon firms is expected to reach between 300 billion and 400 billion won, roughly 1.5 to 2 times the initial contribution. The fund will be used to help scale up companies across diverse fields such as artificial intelligence (AI), bio, content and culture, and energy, and Hana Securities is preparing for an official launch targeted for October.
Second, a total of 150 billion won in technology guarantees will be supplied not only for future growth engine (ABC+E) sectors but also for technology-based small and medium-sized enterprises across all fields, including the root industries that form the backbone of Incheon’s economy. Preferential interest rates and reduced guarantee fees will be added to significantly ease companies’ financial cost burdens. Related institutions, including Hana Bank and KIBO, are carrying out internal procedures with the goal of accepting applications and executing loans in September.
The third task is inclusive financial support that spans ordinary citizens, small merchants and young people. Working with Hana Bank, Incheon will offer preferential interest rates on financial products for ordinary residents, and provide customized support such as principal repayment deferrals and reductions for vulnerable borrowers who have faithfully repaid their loans despite difficult circumstances. Through community-based environmental, social and governance (ESG) projects, the city will also help victims of leasehold-deposit fraud stabilize their housing and recover their daily lives, and support infrastructure improvements directly tied to residents’ lives, such as installing cooling facilities in traditional markets.
The significance of these agreements lies in their design, which allows the warmth of financial support to flow from companies into residents’ everyday lives. By binding growth capital for companies, relief from ordinary citizens’ financial burdens, support for leasehold-fraud victims and improvements to traditional markets within a single agreement framework, the initiative aims for a structure in which the fruits of growth do not stay with a particular group but circulate throughout the entire region.
Going forward, Incheon plans to form a working-level council with the participating institutions to ensure the support programs proceed without disruption, while continuously developing shared-growth policies that revitalize the people’s economy.
Mayor Park Chan-dae said, ‘We expect this to serve as the foundation for building a regional virtuous cycle in which solid corporate growth leads directly to benefits for residents,’ adding, ‘To create overwhelming growth and happy change in Incheon, the city will work together not only on its own but alongside local companies.’
지역 홍보대사 신청 기자양성과정 신청 코리안투데이 지부장 신청 코리안투데이 인천강화코리안브랜드대상 신청 최고경영인대상 신청 소비자만족도대상 신청
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