From the Factory Floor to a Robot-Staffed Office

🏭 Five stages of Korean industry

• 1
  1960sLight-industry exports
  Wigs, plywood, textiles: labor-intensive goods made for export. With little capital and less technology, people were the country's one resource, and the sewing floors of the Guro Industrial Complex were the face of industry.
• 2
  1970sHeavy and chemical industry
  The axis shifted to steel, shipbuilding and petrochemicals. A steelworks rose in Pohang and shipyards in Ulsan, and the image of Korean industry became the smokestack and the dry dock.
• 3
  1980s and 1990sSemiconductors and cars
  Competition moved from cheap labor to technology. Memory chips and cars took over as the main exports, and Korean products began to build a name in world markets.
• 4
  Late 1990s to 2000sIT ventures after the 1997 crisis
  The 1997 financial crisis shook the old order built around large conglomerates, and a startup boom filled some of the gap. Riding the rollout of broadband, internet firms such as NAVER and Daum were born, and for the first time something other than manufacturing joined the core of the economy.
• 5
  Late 2010s onwardAI and robotics
  Artificial intelligence, cloud computing and robotics now sit on top of manufacturing strengths in chips and batteries. The building that represents Korean industry is shifting too, from the factory toward the research center, the data center and the office itself.

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