Yonsei University‘s Severance Hospital has decided to introduce non-face-to-face care program for inpatients to increase efficiency and minimize the risk of virus infection amid the prolonged COVID-19 pandemic. Severance announced Tuesday that it will introduce the telemedicine application My Severance, which will make doctors’ ward rounds digital. Patients at the hospital will be advised to download the application, which will automatically send alerts to patients at the time o

The South Korean government is looking for a significant budget cut for COVID-19 vaccine and treatment development programs next year, a lawmaker said Monday. According to the budget proposal that main opposition People Power Party Rep. Jeon Bong-min acquired from the Ministry of Health and Welfare, the government plans to spend 89.3 billion won ($76 million) on support of COVID-19 vaccine and treatment development in 2022, down 32 percent compared to this year. Rep. Jeon said the support to c

South Korean drug company JW Pharmaceutical said Monday that a patent regarding its gout treatment URC102 has been granted by the European Patent Office.　 URC102 is a potential inhibitor of human uric acid transporter 1, which JW Pharmaceutical is developing as a potential treatment for patients with gout. It completed the phase 2b clinical trial in March, which involved 171 patients with gout here. According to the firm, the patent includes manufacturing measures for URC102 and a key intermed

The number of drugs under development at South Korean companies has increased by 158 percent in the past three years, according to a local survey released Sunday. According to Korea Pharmaceutical and Bio-Pharma Manufacturers Association’s survey on 299 pharmaceutical and biotech companies here, 193 firms currently operate 1,477 new product pipelines, up 157.8 percent from 100 firms’ 573 pipelines in 2018. Of the 1,477 pipelines, 599 are for developing traditional nonbiologic pha

Sales of local restaurants and bars have dropped to their lowest level due to toughened social distancing rules during the COVID-19 pandemic, government data showed Sunday. According to the Korean Statistical Information Service, the retail sales index of restaurants and bars for the first seven months of this year marked 77, the lowest since it started to compile related data in 2015 with a benchmark of 100. The data showed the COVID-19 pandemic has weighed on the already-struggling restaur

South Korea’s antitrust watchdog will embark on a process of punitive action against SK Group and its chairman Chey Tae-won over an accusation that he plundered corporate profits during the group’s 2017 buyout of silicon wafer manufacturing firm LG Siltron, now SK Siltron. According to industry sources on Friday, the Fair Trade Commission here is expected to inform SK Group of findings on its investigation into the SK Group’s possible irregularities during the purchase of th

Daewoong Pharmaceutical is under a prosecutors’ investigation, with industry sources suggesting Friday that the subject of the probe is trade secret misappropriation. The Seoul Central District Prosecutor’s Office said it conducted a search and seizure operation at Daewoong’s headquarters in Samsung-dong, Gangnam-gu, Seoul, Thursday. Officials from the prosecutor’s office did not disclose charges against the South Korean pharmaceutical firm. Some industry sources ra

South Korea has produced only one unicorn startup so far this year, falling far behind the US and China, according to a report from the Federation of Korean Industries. Across the world, a total of 291 startups have attained unicorn status -- reaching a market valuation of over $1 billion -- during the January-July period, according to the FKI report, citing data from tech market research firm CB Insights. Market Kurly, a food delivery and logistics platform here, was the only South Korean e

P&O Chemical, a joint venture between Posco Chemical and OCI, will produce petroleum pitch material for lithium-ion batteries, to respond to increasing demand for battery cells around the globe, Posco Chemical said Thursday. Petroleum pitch is used as a base material for anodes when producing lithium-ion batteries. According to Posco Chemical, the company and its partner OCI will invest a combined 74.5 billion won ($63.4 million) in the joint venture’s project, with a goal of secu

A research team at the Daejeon-based Institute for Basic Science has succeeded in growing single-crystal graphene films that have no wrinkles, folds or adlayers, paving the way for technological advancement in a wide range of fields and industries, including semiconductors, displays and solar cell products. Led by professor Rod Ruoff, the research, titled “Single Crystal, Large-area, Fold-free Monolayer Graphene,” has been published in the leading science journal Nature. Graphene

SK Telecom launched a new subscription-based e-commerce platform T Universe on Wednesday, aiming to attract 36 million subscribers out of the country’s total population of 51 million by 2025. In a press conference held Wednesday, the South Korean telecommunications firm said it has set a target of logging annual transactions worth 8 trillion won ($6.85 billion) by 2025. “T Universe aims to create a new universe of subscription services that benefits both customers and business p

A consortium including GS Group will buy a near half stake in South Korean botulinum toxin manufacturer Hugel for 1.7 trillion won ($1.5 billion), it was announced Wednesday. The deal involves the transfer of a 46.9 percent stake in Hugel currently held by the US private equity Bain Capital. Aside from GS, members of the consortium include CBC, Asia‘s largest healthcare-dedicated investment firm headquartered in Singapore; Mubadala Investment Company, the Abu Dhabi-based investor; and

South Korean biotech firm Seegene has cleared the final hurdle to market in Europe its new sample collection device for COVID-19 diagnostic tests. According to the firm Tuesday, the product, called Combo Swab, has received a CE mark and can be legally commercialized in the EU. A CE mark, required on most goods sold in Europe, shows a product’s conformity to EU’s health, safety and environmental standards. According to Seegene, the sample collection device can be used for its fou

DataStreams, a local big data and cloud solutions provider, said Tuesday that CEO Lee Young-sang has joined the Children’s Traffic Safety Relay Challenge. The road safety campaign was launched on social media in December last year by the Ministry of the Interior and Safety in a bid to raise awareness of children’s road and traffic safety. DataStreams’ chief, as well as four executive members and employees, have joined the relay campaign following an invitation from TSE CEO

South Korean drugmaker Medytox said Tuesday that it has hired Quinn Emanuel Urquhart & Sullivan, a top international law firms, to better respond to intellectual property infringements and misappropriations of the company’s botulinum toxin product. Quinn Emanuel is a law firm specializing in intellectual property litigations, and they are widely known here for representing Samsung Electronics in the company‘s lawsuits against Apple and Huawei. “The US International Trad