"We will select 100 promising overseas startup teams to grow in Korea."
The Ministry of SMEs and Startups and the Korea Institute of Startup and Entrepreneurship Development (KISED) said they will recruit participants for the "2026 K-Startup Grand Challenge" from the 6th to June 17.
The "K-Startup Grand Challenge" is a foreign startup competition held annually since 2016 to discover outstanding overseas (prospective) startups and support their settlement and growth in Korea.
This year, about 100 teams will be selected, and the program will be run in two tracks: 80 teams in the general track and 20 teams in the international student track. In particular, a "support track for international students" was newly created to expand participation by foreign student talent in the domestic startup ecosystem.
Selected corporations will be provided with a step-by-step program for entering the Korean market for about 10 months. Participating teams will receive various support, including ◇ market exploration and localization strategy development ◇ collaboration linkages with large and mid-sized corporations ◇ investor networking. In addition, through the demo day held during the program, corporations selected as excellent performers will receive prize money of up to 1 billion won.
Yu Jong-pil, head of the Korea Institute of Startup and Entrepreneurship Development (KISED), said, "We are focusing on ensuring that overseas startups go beyond simply experiencing startup activities in the Korean market to actually establishing legal entities and growing their businesses," and added, "We will actively support talented foreign professionals with strong capabilities so they can enter Korea's startup ecosystem."