Press

Daejeon Metropolitan City and the Daejeon Creative Economy Innovation Center (Director Park Dae-hee, hereinafter referred to as Daejeon Innovation Center) have selected 15 outstanding teams for the 4th batch of 'Social Impact Changers,' a program to discover and nurture social ventures based on science and technology in Daejeon, and will provide education, mentoring, and commercialization support funds. Through the 4th batch of Social Impact Changers, fields including AI/IT-based ventures (10 teams), manufacturing technology-based ventures (2 teams), and future energy (3 teams) were selected. 'Social Impact Changers' is a systematic program launched by Daejeon Metropolitan City and the Daejeon Creative Economy Innovation Center in partnership with Underdogs Inc. since 2020 to discover and nurture technology-based social ventures that solve social problems based on technological capabilities and ideas. The core focus is to support startups utilizing Daejeon's technological infrastructure to build sustainable business models and address social issues. The 4th batch of Social Impact Changers selected a total of 15 early-stage technology-based social ventures in Daejeon with a history of less than 7 years, and will conduct 'idea validation' and 'business model sophistication' education over 10 weeks. The business model sophistication process is divided into technology commercialization and impact investment fields, providing 1:1 expert-matched mentoring, networking with established companies, market validation, and IR consulting for future fundraising to coach success strategies. Among these, 10 teams will be selected as excellent teams and will receive up to 30 million won in commercialization support funds. The Daejeon Innovation Center plans to provide continuous opportunities including final outcome sharing sessions and investor-targeted IR demo days after the program concludes, as well as office space benefits and follow-up project connections. Park Dae-hee, director of the Daejeon Innovation Center, expressed expectations, stating, "We will spare no effort in supporting Daejeon's social ventures, which possess high-level technological infrastructure, to grow stably based on science and technology," and added, "I hope this becomes an opportunity for Daejeon-style social ventures to be born."