▲ AI PRISM* Personalized Economic Briefing
* Editor's note: AI PRISM (Personalized Report & Insight Summarizing Media) is an AI-based personalized news recommendation and summary service developed with support from the Korea Press Foundation. It selects and provides six customized news items by reader type.
[Key Issue Briefing]
■ Taste-Based Travel: Jigu Playground, a travel platform, is drawing in Koreans in their 20s and 30s by planning themed travel products that reflect consumer taste data gathered through surveys. Its distinctive approach turns the top three preferred destinations, chosen by advance vote, into actual products, and builds camaraderie among participants before departure through group messenger channels, carpooling and team missions. Participants, who numbered nine in the service's early days, have now grown to about 140 a month.
■ Private-Sector Startup Support: Marking its 65th anniversary, the Federation of Korean Entrepreneurs is launching the "Plus Startup" project, which selects 100 teams of prospective and early-stage entrepreneurs and supports them from incubation through investment matching. It offers one-on-one consulting by former executives of large companies, proof-of-concept (PoC) testing, and opportunities for business cooperation with large and mid-sized firms through open innovation. As a result, efforts to build a private-sector-led startup support system are getting into full swing.
■ Software Transformation: As Adobe joins hands with the AI chatbots that were once its rivals, survival strategies in the software industry are changing. As AI advances into an agent stage in which it even carries out tasks, fears of a "SaaS-pocalypse" have spread, and at home, moves to find a way forward — including shifts in revenue models and going private — are continuing. Still, some point out that more time and results are needed before such transformations translate into market confidence.
[News of Interest to Startup Founders]
1. Taste- and Relationship-Based Destinations Win Over Those in Their 20s and 30s
- Key summary: Travel platform Jigu Playground has tapped into demand among Koreans in their 20s and 30s with themed trips that put taste and relationships front and center. In an interview with Seoul Economic Daily on the 7th, Jigu Playground CEO Kim Bo-ram said that travel is well suited as a medium for inner growth, since it is an experience through which one realizes and changes with one's whole body. The company gathers taste data through surveys and turns the top three preferred destinations into products through advance voting; a two-day, one-night Ulleungdo package combining an ocean-view cruise and snorkeling proved popular. Travel participants, who numbered nine in the service's early days, have now grown to about 140 a month, and the website draws an average of 400 visitors a day.
2. Business Federation to Nurture 100 Startup Teams, Support Investment and Big-Company Ties
- Key summary: The Federation of Korean Entrepreneurs said on the 9th that it is pursuing the "Plus Startup" project, which selects 100 teams of prospective and early-stage entrepreneurs and supports them from incubation through investment matching. Applicants must be prospective entrepreneurs or startups no more than seven years old; those in emerging fields such as AI, semiconductors, bio and healthcare, robotics, advanced manufacturing, and climate and energy may apply if they are no more than 10 years old. The program will select 30 teams of prospective entrepreneurs and 70 early-stage startups, offering a 12-week customized program, one-on-one consulting by former executives of large companies, and proof-of-concept (PoC) services. Applications will be accepted from the 10th to the 28th through the official Plus Startup website and the federation's website.
3. From Chatbot Integration to Going Private: Software Industry Seeks a Way to Survive
- Key summary: Adobe launched "Adobe Plug-in in ChatGPT," which lets users access more than 70 of its product features within ChatGPT, worldwide on the 6th local time. After a user types "@Adobe" in the ChatGPT input box and describes the desired result, the plug-in selects the appropriate tool and carries out the task. Adobe, which has already applied the service to Claude and Copilot, will expand to Gemini and Slack later this month. Salesforce, meanwhile, is changing its pricing model from the number of employee accounts to the volume of agent work, while Hancom (030520) has declared its transformation into an "agentic operating system (OS)" company. Douzone Bizon (012510) went private last month. Meanwhile, shares of Adobe and Salesforce have fallen 20% and 24%, respectively, so far this year.
[News for Startup Founders' Reference]
4. Foreigners Wary of AI Dump 6 Trillion Won of Chip Stocks in a Week
- Key summary: Foreign investors were found to have sold nearly 6 trillion won worth of domestic semiconductor-related stocks this month. According to the Korea Exchange, the top five stocks that foreigners net-sold from the 3rd to the 7th of this month were SK hynix (000660), Samsung Electronics (005930), Samsung Electro-Mechanics (009150), Daeduck Electronics (353200) and Hanmi Semiconductor (042700), with net sales reaching 5.9183 trillion won. By contrast, Samsung C&T (028260), Celltrion (068270), Samsung Biologics (207940), Hanwha Aerospace (012450) and Kia (000270) were among the net-bought stocks, suggesting that some of the withdrawn funds flowed into bio, defense and autos. As a result, as of the 7th, SK hynix's foreign ownership stood at 50.84% and Samsung Electronics' at 46.63%, down 5.77 percentage points from the early-year high of 52.40%.
5. Missha's U.S. TikTok Shop Sales Jump Ninefold on "Cardi B Effect" as BB Cream Sales Surge
- Key summary: Able C&C (078520) said on the 9th that January-July U.S. TikTok Shop sales for its brand Missha rose 816% from a year earlier. Sales surged after global artist Cardi B introduced Missha products in a TikTok video. The video surpassed a cumulative 10 million views on TikTok and Instagram within a week of its release. As a result, the bundle of the "M Perfect Cover Serum BB Cream" and "Glow BB Boomer" that Cardi B used saw sales rise 329% in the seven days after the video's release compared with the previous week. Missha also sells the BB cream in 10 shades to account for the diverse skin tones of U.S. consumers, and is expanding its channels to TikTok Shop after Amazon.
6. [Exclusive] KAIST to Build AI Data Center at Its Main Campus
- Key summary: The Korea Advanced Institute of Science and Technology (KAIST) has begun design work on a new "AI-Science Data Center" to support AI-based convergence research at its main campus in Yuseong-gu, Daejeon. It is being planned with a total floor area of 9,100 square meters and a structure ranging from two basement floors to six above-ground floors, with total estimated construction costs of about 35 billion won excluding IT equipment, and completion expected to take about four years. Since the government plans to allocate the graphics processing units (GPUs) it procures mainly to academia, research institutions and small and mid-sized firms, a substantial portion of the computing resources is expected to be covered by government support. Meanwhile, the University of Texas at Austin plans to expand a 9-megawatt AI data center to 19 megawatts, and Stanford University operates its Sherlock cluster of more than 1,200 GPUs, as competition among universities to secure AI infrastructure intensifies.
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