The British Chamber of Commerce will hold a workshop in Seoul on Jan. 17 to discuss reforms of the retirement pension and severance rules for all employees.Patrick J. Monaghan, senior foreign legal consultant at Kim and Chang law firm, will speak about outsourcing and expansion of the discretionary working system and leveling the playing field between large corporations and small and medium enterprises.Monaghan is a member of the firm’s labor and employment practice and advises both foreign and

IE Business School will offer a free lecture and networking evening with as guest lecturer, the school’s chair of the Entrepreneurship Management Department.Pablo de Holan is a popular professor of strategy at IE Business School and will present the school’s 4th lecture in a series on global business innovations on Jan. 13 from 7 p.m. at the COEX Convention Center Hall C room 318 A in southern Seoul.Titled “The Giant Within: How Businesses Grow Thru Entrepreneurship and Innovation, A review of r

The Federation of Korean Industries on Thursday pledged to make aggressive investments and hire more workers this year despite a gloomy outlook for the global economy. The seven members of the lobby for big businesses, along with FKI chairman Huh Chang-soo, held their first meeting this year at the Lotte Hotel Seoul in central Seoul on Thursday. The nation’s top 30 conglomerates agreed to continue investments this year. In 2011, they had planned to invest 11.5 trillion won and hire 1 million new

The South Korean government is suspected of having exaggerated an oil development deal with the United Arab Emirates, which it earlier claimed would “guarantee” participation by South Korean companies, informed sources said Thursday.The government had claimed its memorandum of understanding, signed with the UAE early last year, would entitle the country to a production-sharing-agreement at one of the Middle Eastern country’s six production mines with more than 1 billion barrels of oil in confirm

Korean smartphone users preferred using their handsets for Web surfing rather than for voice calling and text messaging, a government survey found Thursday. The Korea Communications Commission and the Korea Internet and Security Agency questioned 4,000 smartphone and tablet PC users aged between 12-59 in November. According to the survey, 42.4 percent of respondents cited the Internet and mobile apps as their main purpose of smartphone use, while voice calling and text messaging make up 39.3 per

An appeals court here ruled on Thursday in support of the local fair trade watchdog's decision to fine 16 airlines for fuel surcharge price fixing.The Seoul High Court rejected Thai Airways International's demand that the Fair Trade Commission withdraw its 2.1 billion won ($1.8 million) penalty impo

HONG KONG (Yonhap) -- South Korean cosmetics maker Genic Co. is set to begin operations in China this year in a bid to tap into the world's fastest growing cosmetics market, officials said Thursday.Genic recently obtained approval for a hygiene permit from the Chinese Ministry of Health in order to

HONG KONG (Yonhap News) ― Korea’s state-run pension fund is seeking to invest as much as $300 million in Chinese stock markets as it looks to diversify assets worth nearly $300 billion, officials said.The National Pension Service said earlier this week that it received the status of “qualified foreign institutional investor” from the China Securities Regulatory Commission.The pension fund service expects to receive a quota ranging from $100 million to $300 million, equivalent to 0.1 percent or l

The growth of Korea‘s money supply remained at the same pace in November of last year as the previous month although it picked up from a year earlier, the central bank said Thursday. Korea’s M2, a narrow measure of the money supply, totaled 1753.3 trillion won ($1.5 trillion) in November 2011, up 4.4 percent from a year earlier, according to the Bank of Korea.The growth speed of November M2 remained unchanged from a 4.4 percent on-year expansion tallied in October, which marked the sharpest grow

Uncertainties stemming from the eurozone debt crisis are likely to impact the Korean economy, Asia‘s fourth-largest, by sapping overseas demand for local products, HSBC Bank Plc said Thursday.“The uncertainties may have dampening impacts on (Korea’s) export mechanism ... If consumers are cautious, they will buy less goods,” Steven Major, Global Head of HSBC‘s Fixed Income Research, told reporters in a media session.Major said Germany may be an exception that could help offset weakening demand in

Korea’s fund market suffered a setback last year, with its aggregate amount of money parked for stock and bond investment shrinking amid heightened global growth risks and wobbly financial markets, data showed Thursday. According to the data from the Korea Financial Investment Association, the total amount under management of local funds stood at 298.5 trillion won ($257.4 billion) as of the end of December, down 6.3 percent from 318.8 trillion won a year earlier. The latest figure marked the fi