South Korea will ramp up its investment in research and development for technologies that will accelerate the advent of the fourth industrial revolution such as self-driving car and Internet of Things (IoT) technologies.

The Ministry of Trade, Industry and Energy announced Tuesday it would up its R&D spending on five promising industries - autonomous car, IoT-fitted electronics, semiconductor and display, bio-health and renewable energy - to 50 percent of the country’s total R&D spending by 2022 from the current 30 percent. The government has allocated about 900 billion won ($844 million) to the five sectors out of this year’s total R&D spending of 3.16 trillion won.

Along with it, the ministry will seek to foster the development of original technologies and related core technologies and the growth of the new industries with those technologies through the prompt commercialization.

It will also aid private companies in adopting technologies developed by outside talents. With the revised rule, companies are required to pay only 30 percent of the full cost in cash when acquiring technologies from other sources and the rest in non-cash asset. Currently companies have to bear about 50 percent of the full cost in cash. The ministry will also implement a new review system run by a group of renowned professionals who will assess the feasibility of novel technologies and development plans.

By Ko Jae-man and Lee Ha-yeon

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