South Korea to Create 2 Trillion Won in Public Drone Demand

The government will create 2 trillion won (US$1.3 billion) worth of public sector demand for drones over the next five years to help make the local drone industry globally competitive, officials said Thursday.

The goal was a key part of the "K-Drone Dominance" strategy finalized at a meeting of a civilian-government task force formed in March to come up with measures to foster the local drone industry, comprising mostly small firms.

The strategy focuses on ensuring stable demand so that drone firms can make large-scale investments.

"The solution is to muster all government capabilities to explosively create about 2 trillion won worth of public sector demand and change the paradigm of the Republic of Korea's drone industry," the government said in a release.

Currently, about 600 drone manufacturing firms are in operation in South Korea, but most of them are micro-businesses with annual sales of less than 170 million won ($111,000) and heavily rely on imports from China for key parts as they lack core technologies.

The government also announced 10 key tasks aimed at growing the industry, including establishing what is called the "national drone and anti-drone strategy implementation team" under the Prime Minister's Office so that it can play the role of a control tower on drone-related issues.

Other tasks include standardizing drone parts and providing financial and tax benefits.

"The success of an industry growth strategy lies not in splendid plans but in implementing tasks thoroughly and checking on progress," Prime Minister Kim Min-seok said during the meeting. "The envisioned national drone and anti-drone strategy implementation team should take the lead and intensively manage the progress in the 10 major tasks and budget execution."