Press

Underdogs, a startup education specialist company (CEO Cho Sang-rae), participated in 'SOVAC 2022 (Social Value Connect 2022)' held at the Walkerhill Hotel in Gwangjin-gu, Seoul on the 20th, highlighting the importance of fostering a local startup ecosystem. SOVAC is South Korea's largest event dedicated to social value, established to spread consensus on social value and expand the ecosystem, with its first launch in 2019. It serves as an online and offline collaboration platform where experts and citizens from various sectors including social enterprises, non-profit organizations, government, academia, and businesses share people, knowledge, and solutions regarding social problem-solving and social value creation. Through SOVAC 2022, Underdogs emphasized the importance of nurturing locally-settled entrepreneurs and strengthening the capabilities of local SMEs as solutions to address the crisis of regional decline. The company also introduced actual project cases by topic, including regional settlement-type startup education, nationwide startup education to address regional decline, and SME capability enhancement. In particular, Underdogs introduced 'Localize Gunsan,' a project conducted jointly with SK E&S, as a case of fostering a regional settlement-type startup ecosystem. This highlighted their experience in creating public-private-academic cooperative structures and fostering a total of 26 startup teams over three years, as well as the socio-economic effects created by these teams. Additionally, through the ongoing 'Hana Social Venture University' project with Hana Financial Group, the company shared their process of developing 500 prospective and early-stage entrepreneurs and 50 local startup coaches, using universities in regions facing decline as startup ecosystem hubs. Furthermore, based on cases including the 'Join Jeongeup Project' and 'Naver Square Local Food Brand School,' Underdogs introduced their experience in branding and digital transformation education to strengthen local SMEs. CEO Cho Sang-rae stated, "While various efforts to address the crisis of regional decline continue, fostering a local startup ecosystem can be an important solution," emphasizing that "nurturing local SME owners creates the foundation for regional economy and possesses social value in their very existence." Since its establishment in 2015, Underdogs has been leading the startup education market by discovering and cultivating over 10,000 entrepreneurs nationwide as of 2022, introducing practical coaching education to the startup education market starting with the 'Underdogs Military Academy.'