Gangwon Innovation Center Holds '2025 Travel-Up Day' Demoday for Tourism & Culture Startups

The Gangwon Center for Creative Economy & Innovation (Gangwon CCEI) successfully hosted '2025 Travel-Up Day' from the 20th to the 21st, invigorating the leap forward for tourism and culture startups in Gangwon-do Special Self-Governing Province. The event, held at KT&G Sangsangmadang Stay Hotel in Chuncheon, saw 15 innovative startups, being nurtured with support from Gangwon Province, participate in IR pitching sessions where they presented their business models (BMs) in front of investment managers from five prominent venture capital (VC) firms, including SJ Investment Partners, Beta Lab, and Bluepoint. The attending VC investment managers provided in-depth feedback on each company's BM and, based on the IR presentations, completed letters of intent for follow-up meetings, thereby increasing the likelihood of actual investment connections. Based on this, Gangwon CCEI plans to actively support practical meetings and cooperation between companies and investors. In addition to the IR sessions, a variety of ancillary programs were held, including networking programs among startups, capacity-building training for founders, gender impact assessment training, and regular meetings of the lead mentor group, providing participating companies with a meaningful time to share their 2025 achievements and explore future collaboration opportunities. An official from Gangwon CCEI emphasized, "The tourism industry is a key growth engine for Gangwon, and startups are the main players leading that change," adding, "Starting with this event, we will do our best to create a healthy startup ecosystem so that companies can gain opportunities for investment and collaboration." The center plans to continue contributing to strengthening the competitiveness of the tourism industry and revitalizing the startup ecosystem in the Gangwon region through ongoing support programs such as investment linkages, commercialization support, and networking expansion.