Success Story
Woo-Jin Foam Tech is a company that produces sound-absorbing materials, insulating components and sound proof materials for use in vehicles. It supplies its products to Hyundai Motor Company and Kia Motors.
Its chairman Keum Byung-chan had started his own small trading firm in his 30’s back in 1990 after leaving a well-known large company. However, the trading firm went under in just a year. He found a new job at a small auto parts manufacturer as a product developer.
At his new job, a series of experimental projects he proposed were turned down with the firm concentrating on sure-fire items in its early growth stage. Then, he came to think about his own business again and left the firm in three years.
He got a small office in Gunpo City, Gyeonggi Province in January 1996 and visited the Korea Credit Guarantee Fund and the Korea Technology Guarantee Fund with his business plans. They looked into his plans, reached a conclusion that they were viable, and helped him prepare 20 million won to carry out the plans.
In its first year in business, Woo-Jin Foam Tech succeeded in developing polyurethane headlining products for excavators and forklift trucks and supplying them to Hyundai Heavy Industries and Samsung Heavy Industries. Then, the company came up with sound-absorbing materials, insulating components and sound proof materials for vehicles and obtained a position as a subcontractor of the Hyundai Motor Group.
15 years ago, Woo-Jin Foam Tech expanded itself and relocated its headquarters to Yongin City, Gyeonggi Province. In 2005, it set up a joint venture with a Chinese firm in Tianjin for supply to Hyundai Motor China. The company is planning to make inroads into more overseas markets now.