NEW YORK — "Starting a business is hard enough in Korea, so imagine how tough it is for people trying to take on the global market with little money," said Jung Se-joo, 46, chairman of United Korean Founders (UKF) and co-founder of the global healthcare company Noom. "Many founders struggle badly because they have to run a business but have no global network."
Jung explained the significance of KOOM Week 2026, set for Oct. 12-18, at a press briefing in Manhattan on the 29th. UKF is a nonprofit set up to nurture the Korean founder ecosystem with North America as its base. The KOOM Festival began in 2019 in San Francisco as a small networking event for Korean founders, gradually grew in scale, and has been held in New York since last year. It has since evolved into a cultural event that combines K-pop and K-food and brings together investors, consumers, brands and creators. Last year's event drew 13,000 people to the Brooklyn Navy Yard in New York, and this year organizers have moved the stage to the Manhattan area.
"The question I get most often about the KOOM Festival is why we do it," Jung said. "Every time, I answer with three words: service, giving and solidarity." He added: "When you come to the U.S. to do business, questions pile up over even the simplest things — getting a driver's license, securing a guarantee to rent a home, going to the hospital — but Korean founders don't band together well. I've been in the U.S. for 21 years and I'm already established, so what I can do for younger founders is use my social capital to bring talent together." Jung, a native of Yeosu, South Jeolla Province (Jeollanam-do), entered Hongik University's department of electronic and electrical engineering in 1999, dropped out after completing his military service, and moved to New York in 2005 with just 5 million won. In 2008 he founded Noom, a health management service built on cognitive behavioral therapy (CBT), which was valued at $3.7 billion (about 5 trillion won) in its Series F funding round in 2021.
As its name suggests, this year's KOOM Week will run for a week at major locations across Manhattan. In the Flatiron area, a K-brand pop-up exhibition will run Oct. 14-18 across an indoor exhibition hall and an outdoor food truck zone. Some 30 emerging brands preparing to enter the U.S. market will take part, including Naver Webtoon, Nongshim and Memebox, spanning beauty, food and beverage, fashion, household goods and content.
On Oct. 16 at Terminal 5, an event venue in Manhattan's Hell's Kitchen, Jung will join Yoo Hyun-joon, a professor in Hongik University's department of architecture; Tim Hwang, founder of FiscalNote; Charlotte Cho, co-founder of Soko Glam; and Sarah Chung, chief executive of Landing International, for talks on the direction to take in the age of artificial intelligence (AI) and on business know-how. A K-pop concert featuring mostly new artists will follow that evening. Networking events for founders, exchanges between Korean and U.S. universities and other side programs will also be held across Manhattan during the week.
"This year we focused on booking K-pop artists who fit our philosophy of a dream built by ordinary people," Jung said. "About 80 office workers are helping run the event on a voluntary basis."
