SEOUL, Dec. 9 (Korea Bizwire) — Rapper Jay-Z’s investment fund has joined hands with a South Korean asset manager to raise a private equity fund (PEF) that invests in Korean entertainment, beauty and lifestyle, officials said Tuesday. MarcyPen Capital Partners LLC, which is backed by the U.S. rapper, recently signed a memorandum of understanding with [...]
SEOUL, Dec. 9 (Korea Bizwire) — Single-person households have become the most common living arrangement in South Korea, accounting for roughly 36 percent of all households last year, according to government data released Tuesday. The annual survey by the Ministry of Data and Statistics found that 8.05 million households consisted of a single person in 2024, [...]
SEOUL, Dec. 9 (Korea Bizwire) — Seoul plans to launch a pilot car-free running program next spring, allowing residents to jog through parts of the city center on weekend mornings, Mayor Oh Se-hoon announced during a visit to Kuala Lumpur this week. The initiative takes inspiration from Kuala Lumpur’s “Car-Free Morning,” a municipal fitness program that [...]
SEOUL, Dec. 9 (Korea Bizwire) — Cigarette smoking among South Korean adults has fallen over the past year, but the use of e-cigarettes has increased, underscoring shifting consumption habits amid persistent public health concerns, according to new national survey data released Monday. The Korea Disease Control and Prevention Agency (KDCA) analyzed findings from its 2025 Community [...]
SEOUL, Dec. 8 (Korea Bizwire) — A nationwide charity running campaign jointly organized by KakaoPay and singer Sean has concluded with record participation, underscoring the rapid rise of digital philanthropy and community fundraising in South Korea. The “2025 Long Run” campaign — designed as an online and offline donation marathon — drew a combined 265,000 participants, [...]
SEOUL, Dec. 8 (Korea Bizwire) — South Korea is quietly becoming more diverse. New census data released by the Ministry of Statistics and Data show that people with a migration background accounted for more than 5 percent of the country’s population in 2024 — a modest but meaningful increase in a nation long assumed to be [...]
SEOUL, Dec. 5 (Korea Bizwire) — South Korea has moved to close a long-criticized legal loophole that allowed parents who abandoned or failed to care for their children to later claim financial benefits after the child’s death. The National Assembly has passed an amendment to the National Pension Act that blocks such parents from receiving survivor [...]
BUSAN, Dec. 5 (Korea Bizwire) — More than half of Busan residents say they feel heavily burdened by their children’s education expenses, which now average 860,000 won (about $660) per month, according to the city’s latest annual social survey. The 2025 Busan Social Survey, released Friday and based on responses from 31,774 residents, paints a detailed [...]
POHANG, Dec. 5 (Korea Bizwire) — The successful fourth launch of South Korea’s homegrown Nuri rocket has had an unexpected beneficiary: Pohang University of Science and Technology (Postech). According to the university on Thursday, the surge in attention began after Park Jong-chan, 53, head of the Korea Aerospace Research Institute’s Nuri rocket advancement program, appeared at [...]
SEOUL, Dec. 5 (Korea Bizwire) — More than half of South Koreans watch news on YouTube every day, and a growing share now views content produced by non-traditional creators — individuals and small businesses — as legitimate news media, according to new research presented at a national policy forum on Thursday. The survey, conducted in August [...]