German R&D Center to Be Established in Korea

The world’s leading engineering sciences research organization, the Fraunhofer-Gesellschaft (FhG) of Germany, has decided to establish an R&D center in Korea.

The Ministry of Information and Communication (MIC) said on Thursday that Minister Chin Dae-je, president of the FhG Hans-Jörg Bullinger, and the German Ambassador to Korea, Michael Geier, will attend the MOU signing ceremony at the MIC office in Seoul on Friday.

The FhG has 60 affiliated research centers in engineering sciences, such as software engineering, laser technology, and toxicology, hiring 13,000 researchers. With an annual research budget of over one billion euros, it is one of the four major institutes in Germany, including Max-Planck, Helmholtz, and Leibniz.

The FhG will set up a computer graphics research center, IGD, focusing on virtual reality, multimedia communications, and copyright protection technologies.

Ten IGD researchers will be dispatched to Korea to carry out joint research projects with scientists of Electronics and Telecommunications Research Institute (ETRI), corporations, and universities in Korea. The IGD will share the cost of operating the R&D center, and the Korean government will support up to 20 billion won over the next four years. Hyundai Motors, Samsung Electronics, and Samsung Heavy Industries will reportedly participate in the projects.

cpu@donga.com