Science ministry to host deep-tech commercialization festival in Daejeon

The science ministry said it will hold a two-day deep-tech commercialization festival at the Daejeon Convention Center in Daejeon on Nov. 12 and 13, bringing together 11 startup and commercialization support organizations under the slogan "Imagination in the lab becomes business in the world."

The 2026 Korea Deep-Tech Commercialization Festival will center on the technology fields of the government's seven SEED project, a national policy task aimed at strengthening support for lab-based deep-tech startups.

The venue will run 14 exhibition and consultation halls under three themes — "Imagination in the Lab," "Deep-Tech Startup" and "Business in the World" — with 135 booths set up by public technology commercialization agencies. Visitors will see prototypes and receive explanations, while researchers and aspiring founders can get advice on building technology startups.

A separate program will pair selected companies with investors. Companies screened in advance by technology and investment experts will hold investor relations presentations, and investors' assessments and the scale of their investment intentions will be announced on site, the ministry said.

Side events will include a one-minute startup pitching studio, where participants present an idea and receive expert advice, and on-site observation of the NEST demo day, in which 13 deep-tech startups will explain their technologies to domestic and foreign investment experts for evaluation. Venture capitalists, accelerators and company builders will share startup know-how and offer tailored consulting.

A stage in the center of the hall will host science talks and performances. Orbit of the online science channel "And Science" will speak on "a new daily life opened by robots and semiconductors," and One Minute Science will address "science and the human future in the AI era." Magician Lee Hyung-woo and science experiment creator Dr. Geonppang will stage a science magic show.

Admission is free. Detailed program and transportation information, along with advance registration, is available on the event website through Nov. 10, and on-site registration will also be accepted on the day of the event.

"This event is a place to experience the entire process of public technology commercialization, in which research results from laboratories move to the market through startups and investment," said Koo Hyuk-chae, first vice minister of science and ICT. "I hope young people in science and engineering and researchers taking on deep-tech challenges, including in the seven SEED project fields, as well as any citizen interested in science and technology, will visit and feel together the future that research results will create."

The festival is linked to national policy task 28-3, which calls for building a system to spread government research and development results and strengthening support for deep-tech lab startups.