Hana signals start of HQ transfer to Incheon

South Korea’s Hana Financial Group marked the transfer of its headquarters from Seoul to Incheon with a groundbreaking ceremony, the firm said Wednesday.

The groundbreaking ceremony for the planned 22-level building with seven underground floors was held Tuesday at Cheongna International City, which is part of the Incheon Free Economic Zone.

Hana Financial and five of its affiliates –- flagship commercial bank Hana Bank, brokerage Hana Financial Investment, credit card issuer Hana Card and insurers Hana Life Insurance and Hana Insurance -- will relocate their head offices to the new site upon its scheduled completion by February 2025.

The design of Hana’s new headquarters was awarded by US-based global architecture firm NBBJ last year in the following categories: Interior Design Magazine Best of Year Awards for the Commercial category, the MIPIM Asia Awards and the Ohio Chapter ASLA Merit Award for Not Constructed Design.

The new headquarters location is the final part of Hana’s three-step “Hana Dream Project,” which aims to bring together the banking group’s key businesses and infrastructure within a 246,000-square-meter site allotted to the firm.

The first part was the completion of Hana Financial Data Center in 2019, which houses 1,800 of its IT-related employees. The second part was the completion of the Hana Global Talent Development Center in May 2019.

The groundbreaking ceremony comes as the Seoul city government has re-launched its long-stalled project of rebranding Seoul as a global financial hub. The city government said last year it will invest 241.8 billion won ($204 million) over five years in the project to transform the city into a financial hub.

The relocation of Hana headquarters is projected to intensify the competition between Seoul and Incheon to become Korea’s financial hub.

Hana Financial last week posted a 2021 net income of nearly 3.4 trillion won, which gained 33.4 percent on-year, according to a regulatory filing.

“Hana’s new head office in Cheongna International City will work as a strong offline platform that will be open 365 days a year to the locals of Incheon, thus forming a society together,” Hana Financial Group Chairman Kim Jung-tai said in a statement.

By Jung Min-kyung (mkjung@heraldcorp.com)