Jeju Creative Economy Innovation Center, 2025 Aerospace Industry Cooperation Forum

## Jeju soars to become an aerospace industry hub: The 2025 Open Ground Meetup successfully held The '2025 Aerospace Open Ground Meetup,' which aims to open the future of Jeju's aerospace industry, successfully commenced, hosted by the Jeju Center for Creative Economy & Innovation (JCCEI) in partnership with Jeju Special Self-Governing Province and Hanwha Systems. The event saw 12 aerospace startups participate, exploring business cooperation opportunities and receiving exceptional benefits, including up to 10 million won in PoC (Proof of Concept) funding upon successful potential matching. **Tailored Support for Innovation, the 'Open Ground Program'** The '2025 Aerospace Open Ground Program' focuses on fostering Jeju as a core hub for the aerospace industry, making the industry more familiar to local residents, and discovering and nurturing promising startups. It supports effective growth by operating two tailored support systems – the 'Booster Track' and 'Builder Track' – to match the growth stage and characteristics of each startup. The meetup event was divided into two parts: Part 1, presenting the blueprint for Jeju's aerospace industry, and Part 2, focusing on actual business cooperation for startups. In Part 1, Jeju Province provided a detailed introduction to its aerospace industry vision and the operational direction of the Hawon Technocampus. Following this, Hanwha Systems announced demand-side challenges and future business plans in the aerospace sector, presenting concrete cooperation opportunities to startups. **Practical Business Connections, Abundant Follow-up Support** In Part 2, track-specific 1:1 business meetings were held for startups to flesh out their presented ideas and connect them to actual businesses, leading to vibrant discussions. Through this program, which continues until December, startups successfully matched with demand companies and partner institutions are promised long-term follow-up support. This includes not only PoC funding but also review for center seed money and investment fund investments, support for office space at the Hawon Technocampus, and phase-specific accelerating programs. Lee Byeong-seon, Head of the Jeju Center, stated his ambition: "We will actively discover startups with technological prowess and creative ideas to firmly establish Jeju as a testbed and innovation hub for the future aerospace industry, and we will strengthen our open innovation model that connects from demonstration to commercialization." This meetup is expected to be an important milestone that opens new horizons for Jeju's aerospace industry.