SEOUL, June 3 (Korea Bizwire) — The number of accidents involving electric kickboards more than doubled last year, fire authorities in Seoul said Wednesday. The two-wheeled vehicle has gained popularity among youth due to speed and convenience, especially during the COVID-19 outbreak as people shun public transport for fear of infection. The Seoul Metropolitan Fire [...]
SEOUL, June 2 (Korea Bizwire) — South Korea’s major companies saw their profitability sink to a 10-year low in 2019 amid an economic slowdown, data showed Tuesday. The average operating margin of the country’s 2,000 major listed companies came to 5.1 percent last year, down from 8.8 percent in 2018 and the lowest level since [...]
SEOUL, June 2 (Korea Bizwire) — South Korean smartphones sales plunged 18 percent in the first quarter from the previous three-month period on the fallout caused by the novel coronavirus outbreak, a market researcher said Monday. According to Counterpoint Research, the domestic mobile phone market, which was expected to post solid growth with the launch [...]
SEOUL, June 1 (Korea Bizwire) — More than 6 million South Koreans were subscribed to 5G mobile networks as of April, a year after the country adopted the service, government data showed Monday. The number of 5G users in the nation reached 6.34 million as of the end of April, up 7.8 percent from a [...]
SEOUL, June 1 (Korea Bizwire) — South Korea’s vehicle sales plunged 36 percent last month from a year earlier as the new coronavirus outbreak continued to dent demand for cars amid the coronavirus pandemic, with overseas sales hit particularly hard, industry data showed Monday. The country’s five carmakers — Hyundai Motor Co., Kia Motors Corp., [...]
SEOUL, June 1 (Korea Bizwire) — Lineage 2M, a mobile massively multiplayer online role-playing game (MMORPG) by South Korean online game maker NCSOFT Corp., was the highest grossing app on the Google Play Store during the first quarter of the year, industry data showed Monday. The mobile version of the mega-hit game “Lineage 2″ was [...]
SEOUL, May 31 (Korea Bizwire) — South Korea’s National Assembly has begun its four-year term with the highest number of female lawmakers, including the country’s first-ever female vice speaker of the unicameral legislature. Among the 300 representatives, who started their four-year term Saturday, 57 members, or 19 percent, are women, marking the largest number in [...]
SEOUL, May 31 (Korea Bizwire) — South Korean held 3.9 credit cards on average last year, data showed Sunday, as credit card holdings in the country continue to increase as more people use credit cards as their preferred payment method. There were 110.98 million credit cards in South Korea as of end-2019, up 5.92 million [...]
SEOUL, May 28 (Korea Bizwire) — The COVID-19 pandemic is taking its toll on employment in South Korea, with the biggest drop in the population of corporate employees reported in April, a government report showed Thursday. The number of people employed by all South Korean businesses that have at least one worker came to 18.22 [...]
SEOUL, May 28 (Korea Bizwire) — Nearly 70 percent of South Korean youths think that reunification with North Korea is necessary, a survey showed on Thursday. According to the poll conducted by the National Youth Policy Institute, 67.8 percent of 3,228 elementary, middle and high school students replied that two Koreas need to reunify. Among [...]