The Ministry of Trade, Industry and Energy (MOTIE) announced plans to kick the Special Act to Accelerate Industrial Digital Transformation into high gear beginning July 5. The Act was legislated in January this year.

This Act is meaningful in that it incorporates the utilization and protection principles concerning industrial data, rationale for comprehensive governmental support, inter-ministerial collaboration mechanism as well as in that it lays the legal grounds for pursuing industrial digital transformation.

On occasion of the aforesaid Act enforcement, MOTIE’s 1^st Vice Minister Jang Young-jin visited a domestic company to gather opinions from industry insiders on their experience regarding the digital transition and their policy recommendations. During this conference, Vice Minister Jang emphasized the importance of a creative, private-led digital transformation process, and assured that the Government will focus on assisting companies with vision and drive for growth. He added that close collaboration based on solidarity and cooperation will be power the creation and expansion of a successful innovative value chain model.

POSCO, LS Electric and LG Electronics, which were designated by the World Economic Forum (WEF) as “Lighthouse Factories”, also participated in the conference to share their rich experience in digital transition and offer suggestions as follows.

First, they concurred that it is important to create an environment where companies dotting the value chain can connect their data and utilize this connection. Standardization of industrial data and establishing data platforms are more detailed extension of ideas.

Second, “digital experts” should not be concentrated in one or two particular industries as is often the case, but be distributed more evenly across various sectors, namely manufacturing.

Third, support for digital transformation should no longer be uniformly supplier-oriented but cater to the differing needs of each SME.

Fourth, small and mid-sized subcontractors are likely to be less concerned with digital transformation than they are with increasing their infrastructure in the short term, so raising fundamental awareness on the need for digital transformation is in order.

Vice Minister Jang revealed that the Industrial Digital Transformation Masterplan will be finished by the second half of 2022, and urged large companies to play leading roles in ushering in the digital innovation ecosystem by sharing data, successful cases and technologies with middle market companies and SMEs.

Prior to the conference, the Vice Minister had visited LS Electric’s Cheongju factory to inspect their production lines for electrical equipment and encouraged the company that it will “be a model example for the industry through not only digital transformation of individual factory units, but by the development of a win-win data sharing platform."