Nearly a third of Korea's SME-ministry innovation products have never had a public buyer

A pilot purchase is the Public Procurement Service buying a product's first units itself. For 59 of the ministry's certified products, it is the only public sale on record ^[6]. Add the products that never sold at all and 245 of the 591 designations, or 41.5%, have no buyer among public institutions other than the procurement agency ^[16]. The ministry says the label exists to get products into early use through purchases by public institutions ^[3].

Those pilots were sizeable. They averaged roughly 203 million won a product ^[19], and 43 of the 59 contracts were worth more than 100 million won each ^[7].

Sedaily's report presents its single-buyer figure as a picture of public procurement as a whole ^[8]. Its base of 405 products is exactly 591 less 186, the ministry's own count of products with any purchase ^[15]. If that is the ministry's cohort, then 267 of the 591, or 45.2%, have sold to more than one public institution ^[14].

Had the ministry's products won pilots at the budget office's average rate, the 591 would hold about 258 pilot contracts, 64 more than they do ^[18]. The comparison is loose. The budget office counts all designations through last year, while the ministry's figures begin in 2020 ^[4][1].

There are innocent explanations for some of this. The report does not break the 591 down by designation year ^[1], so products certified last year may not yet have had time to find buyers. A product built for one agency's work will have one buyer by design. And the ministry draws candidates partly from R&D projects ^[3]. Research output can be further from what procurement offices buy than products that come in by other routes. We think the label is working for many of these firms mainly as a route to one state-paid order. The case for it as a source of public customers rests on two groups: the 211 products public institutions bought with no pilot at all ^[17], and the 135 piloted products that went on to other public buyers ^[20]. A year-by-year breakdown showing the 2020 and 2021 cohorts spread across several buyers each would prove that view wrong.

Both responses in the report call for more effort to find buyers. "The ministry is working to identify purchasing demand at public institutions and help firms secure early sales channels in order to expand purchases of innovation products," a ministry official said ^[11]. Its tools include demonstration purchases and first government purchases ^[10]. Cho said the program will deliver results only if certification leads to actual purchases and use in the field ^[13]. "Public institutions should actively identify purchasing demand and widen sales channels so that innovation products can be used at more public work sites," she said ^[12].