KT&G (President: Baek Bok-In) is opening a fifth recruitment for participants in its “KT&G Sang Sang Startup Camp”, a program aimed at helping young people start their own businesses. This fifth session will be open from today to November 10.

The KT&G Sang Sang Startup Camp is a 14-week program designed to discover and nurture young entrepreneurs who intend to resolve social challenges such as recycling resources or providing support for the underprivileged through corporate businesses. It consists of specialized and differentiated subprograms to help create startups for social innovation. Notably, former and current entrepreneurs provide customized coaching for each team, and professional mentoring in each area. Outstanding teams are granted office spaces to commercialize their business items. 

Any prospective entrepreneur who dreams of establishing a startup can apply for the camp and the entire program is offered free of charge under the sponsorship of KT&G. Applications are received at the “KT&G Sang Sang Startup Camp” website (http://sangsangstartupcamp.com). Applicants should fill in the required fields such as the reason for application, capabilities, and ideas for social innovation. In total, 40 participants will be selected.

KT&G will hold an online preliminary briefing session on October 27 to provide detailed information on the program. This session will be broadcasted live on the YouTube channel “KT&G Sang Sang Startup Camp” for about one hour, starting from 6:30 pm. This will be followed by the announcement of selected participants on December 2, an introductory program starting on December 14, and a practical training course on startups spanning until March 17.  

KT&G is contributing to job creation for young people through the KT&G Sang Sang Startup Camp. The entrepreneurs produced from the four annual sessions since the program’s first launch in 2017 have generated total sales of up to 647 million won and have made achievements such as all 30 teams being admitted to the government-funded “Social Enterprise Fostering Project.” Recognized for the excellence of this program aimed at supporting startups, the company received a citation as “a company of national merit for nurturing social entrepreneurs” from the Minister of Labor in 2019. 

Kim Gyeong-Dong, head of the KT&G contribution team, said, “The prolonged COVID-19 situation is weakening corporate activities and significantly reducing jobs. We will develop ideas for social innovation-oriented startups that can overcome these difficult times by cultivating young entrepreneurs, and thereby contribute to job creation.”