The Ministry of SMEs and Startups announced on the 12th that it will supply technology guarantees worth a total of 26.7 trillion won this year, including new guarantees of 5.7 trillion won and maturity extensions of 21 trillion won.
Technology guarantee is a policy finance that provides guarantees through the Technology Guarantee Fund following evaluating the technology level of SMEs, when it is difficult for SMEs to develop technology or apply existing technology to commercialization due to lack of collateral or low credit rating.
The Ministry of SMEs and Startups plans to supply new guarantees this year at a scale of 5.7 trillion won, an increase of 1.5 trillion won compared to the previous year, and support 60% of new guarantees in the first half.
The Ministry of SMEs and Startups will provide 2.4 trillion won for scale-up and digitization of companies in future new industries such as super-gap, and 2.2 trillion won for technology development, intellectual property commercialization, and support for export companies.
80% of the total funds are provided as working capital so that they can be used as funds necessary for business operation, such as the increased cost of purchasing raw materials due to the three highs such as high interest rates, high exchange rates, and high prices.
In order to ease the management burden caused by the third high school phenomenon, it was decided to extend the guarantee period by one year in the amount of 21 trillion won to companies experiencing difficulties in repayment of principal.
In addition, for new guarantees in the first half of this year, the guarantee fee rate will be reduced by 0.2%p to ease the financial burden. Through this, regarding 11,400 companies are expected to benefit from lower guarantee fees.
In addition, when using the ‘digital branch’, which proceeds through the Internet from guarantee application to guarantee certificate issuance, a new function is introduced to recommend a guarantee suitable for the characteristics of the company by using artificial intelligence (AI).
Companies can receive guarantee product recommendations without visiting the Korea Technology Finance Corporation by entering various certifications, use of funds, business/type of business, representative technology, and number of workers.
As for the guarantee amount, you can apply for up to 3 billion won for operating funds and 10 billion won for facility funds, and you can apply for up to 10 billion won for scale-up funds.
In particular, 1.7 trillion won will be intensively supported for companies engaged in new businesses in the future, such as the super-gap sector that will drive growth in the digital economy era. For companies with high sales growth among them, 300 billion won is supported for a scale-up program that supports up to 10 billion won in guarantee for each growth stage.
Smart manufacturing and service guarantees of 400 billion won are also provided to support the funds needed to introduce digital technologies such as AI and data into manufacturing sites and service processes.
In order to strengthen technological competitiveness, 900 billion won in development and commercialization funds required throughout the entire R&D cycle will be supported. The Ministry of SMEs and Startups plans to establish a guarantee-linked R&D fund that supports guarantees before selecting R&D support projects and additionally connects guarantees for commercialization following successful R&D.
270 billion won is provided to promote the commercialization of excellent technologies and to strengthen the competitiveness of excellent companies in the fields of materials, parts, and equipment by operating an intellectual property (IP) guarantee scale of 600 billion won in key areas such as patents, software copyrights, and semiconductor layout design.
For exporting companies, 450 billion won is provided for each stage of export growth, including companies that have no export performance at the moment but are expected to export in the future.
In addition, to support youth startups whose actual managers are under the age of 39, new guarantees will be expanded to 500 billion won this year, and 2.5 trillion won will be supplied by 2027 to support the startups of young people with excellent ideas and technologies.
For ‘excellent young entrepreneurs’ who have participated in start-up support projects by the government as well as private and local governments and are recommended as excellent companies, they decided to give preferential treatment, such as applying a guarantee rate of 100% and a fixed guarantee fee rate of 0.3%, up to 600 million won of the guarantee amount.
In addition, 35 billion won of recovery support guarantee is provided so that even if the business fails, the manager can use the failure as an asset to recover.
Investment-linked guarantees of KRW 350 billion will be provided to support the additional growth of companies that have attracted investment until they proceed with the next round of investment.
It is also decided to provide 200 billion won of guarantees to securitization companies that help promising small and medium-sized venture companies, which have difficulty issuing corporate bonds with their own credit, raise funds by creating securitized securities using newly issued corporate bonds as underlying assets and then selling them in the asset market.
In addition, the Ministry of SMEs and Startups will also reduce the minimum guarantee fee rate applied to new guarantees by 0.2%p from 0.7% to 0.5% in conjunction with the reduction in the guarantee fee rate.
In the case of the ‘one-click guarantee’, which is supported by a small amount of less than 100 million won, the application required documents submitted to the lending bank can be automatically transmitted to the digital branch so that loan and guarantee applications can be applied at the same time.
50 billion won in guarantee-linked investment for early start-up companies and local companies, 40 billion won in factoring service without repayment burden while cashing accounts receivables early, and 500 billion won in guarantee support for small and medium-sized venture companies to respond to carbon neutrality are also provided.
Companies wishing to use technology guarantee can visit a branch office of the technology guarantee fund close to their place of business or visit a digital branch on the website of the technology guarantee fund (www.kibo.or.kr) for warranty application and consultation.
Detailed information is also available through the Korea Technology Finance Corporation’s main phone number (1544-1120).
Inquiries: Venture Policy Division, Venture Policy Division, Ministry of SMEs and Startups 044-204-7703
