Security News > 2000 > December > Korea's Information Security Firms Enjoy Burgeoning Market
http://asia.internet.com/2000/12/1207-koreasecurity.html By Michael Kim Korea Correspondent, asia.internet.com December 7, 2000 SEOUL - Amid growing concerns over cyber-terrorism worldwide, Korea's information security industry is enjoying handsome growth. The Ministry of Information and Communication (MIC), which has conducted a survey of 128 member companies of the Korea Information Security Industry Association, estimated the local market for information security services at about 355 billion won (US$295 million), more than tripling over last year. MIC officials said that they anticipate the Korean information security market will grow by as much as nearly 150 percent next year to 884 billion won (US$736 million). The survey, conducted over a four month period from June, also showed the Korean market moving away from such software products as firewalls and virus vaccines to various services, including intrusion detection systems (IDS). Last year, firewall programs dominated the information security market, accounting for 22.2 percent of the total, followed by virtual private networks (VPN) with 16.4 percent, system integrated (SI) with 14 percent, virus vaccines 12 percent, and intrusion detection systems (IDS) with 6.9 percent. By next year, however, the ministry forecast the market will be remapped and be dominated by SI with an estimated 20.4 percent share, followed by IDS (13.2 percent), firewalls (12.1 percent), VPN (10.7 percent) and virus vaccines (3.8 percent). Most of the nation's information security houses are newcomers--61.6 percent of them are less than four years old and 74 percent with less than 3 billion won (US$2.5 million) capitalization. Despite their relatively small size and newness, 73 percent of the firms were investing more than 10 percent of their sales into research and development, above the average of 7.1 percent for venture companies. Sixty percent of the employees are in research positions. The volume of exports by information security firms also increased tenfold from a mere 2 billion won (US$1.6 million) in 1999 to an estimated 22.9 billion won (US$19 million) this year. The survey showed Japan was the biggest foreign market, followed by China, Europe, North America, and Taiwan. ISN is hosted by SecurityFocus.com --- To unsubscribe email LISTSERV () SecurityFocus com with a message body of "SIGNOFF ISN".