After 30 years of hard work, SK Group has implemented happiness management and grown together with the Chinese market

This year marks the 30th year of SK Group’s growth in China since it entered China in 1991. As one of the first Korean companies to set up branches in China, SK Group has always taken it as its mission to be a “civilian ambassador, economic and trade bridge, and public welfare pioneer” between China and South Korea. Adhering to the belief of “taking from China, using in China, being managed by Chinese people, and developing together with China”, it has actively laid out in China with a 30-year vision, forged ahead, and achieved remarkable results.

As the group's regional headquarters in China, SK China focuses on future industry development trends and continuously invests in AI, semiconductors, ICT, new energy, new materials, logistics and other fields to help promote the development of China's innovative industries.

SK Group actively promotes the development of China's innovative industry

To support the development of China's innovative industry, SK Group has actively explored and laid out plans in many fields over the years, and has established good cooperative relationships with many local governments, institutions, local enterprises and innovative enterprises, working together with them to develop and grow together.

在IT通信领域，SK集团旗下韩国第三大IT服务商SK Inc. C&C于2007年正式进军中国市场，目前已分别在北京、无锡、沈阳、重庆设有分公司，并与中国多家本土企业成为长期合作伙伴。

In the field of petrochemicals, SK and Sinopec jointly invested in the construction of the 800,000 tons/year ethylene project in Wuhan in 2013 and established Sino-Korea Petrochemical. On this basis, the two sides continued to expand cooperation in 2019, integrating the refining business of Sinopec Wuhan Branch to achieve refining and chemical integration. At present, Sino-Korea Petrochemical has a series of refining units with a crude oil processing capacity of 8 million tons/year and a series of chemical production units led by 1.1 million tons/year of ethylene. From the construction of the ethylene project to the integration of refining and chemical, Sino-Korea Petrochemical has a total investment of approximately RMB 35 billion. It is the largest joint venture project between China and South Korea in the field of new energy in China, and it is also the only Sino-foreign joint venture refining and chemical integration project in the Yangtze River Economic Belt.

In addition, in order to help China's emerging companies with potential find a bigger stage, SK Group established the SK China Investment Development Center in China to carry out equity investment business. Since 2017, relying on the industrial background and financial strength of SK Group, it has deeply explored high-quality target companies in China for equity investment. In 2020, SK China invested in Innoscience, BYD Semiconductor and Sotorion, respectively, to help the target companies develop in the long run, in order to achieve a win-win situation for investors and companies. 

It is worth mentioning that with the increasing dependence of SK Group on the Chinese market, more and more of its companies have reached cooperative relations with governments and enterprises in various parts of China in recent years. In 2020, SK Inc., an investment institution of SK Group, invested in Lingbao Huaxin Copper Foil and Shenzhou Medical Big Data respectively to strengthen its layout in core components of electric vehicle batteries and medical big data. In October 2020, SK Innovation, a subsidiary of SK Group, invested US$2.01 billion to complete the first phase of the "SK New Energy (Jiangsu)" power battery project with a planned production capacity of 27GWh. This is of great significance for deepening China-South Korea industrial cooperation and accelerating the development of Yancheng's new energy vehicle industry. In the future, SK Innovation will focus on the field of power batteries to meet the growing needs of global customers with its leading product competitiveness and infrastructure throughout the world.

In June 2021, the Shanghai SK Tower, a city landmark project created by SK Group, was officially completed. The project brings together business offices and exquisite commercial buildings. With a total height of about 280 meters, it is located on the first line of the Expo Riverside and has a 315-degree river view, opening up the global city

In July this year, SK signed a memorandum of understanding (MOU) on investment cooperation with JOYVIO Group, a food investment company controlled by China's Lenovo Group, planning to establish a "Sustainable Food Investment Fund" with a scale of approximately 100 billion won to invest in alternative protein manufacturers such as plant-based alternative meat and fermented protein.

SK Hynix, a subsidiary of SK Group, is a world-leading semiconductor company. It first established a chip factory in China in 2005, and successively established factories in Wuxi and Chongqing. As of 2020, SK Hynix has invested more than US$20 billion in China, of which SK Hynix Wuxi Legal Person has become the foreign-invested enterprise with the largest single investment scale, the highest technical level and the fastest growth rate in Jiangsu Province. In addition, in April 2019, SK Hynix Wuxi C2F was officially completed, marking the continued in-depth development of SK Hynix in Wuxi. In August 2021, the Wuxi High-tech Zone Integrated Circuit Industrial Park, located in Wuxi High-tech Zone, was jointly invested by SK Hynix and Wuxi Xinfa Group Co., Ltd. with a total investment of 2 billion yuan and officially started construction to build a future-oriented industrial base.

SK Group is committed to creating and sharing happiness. Over the past 30 years since entering China, it has adhered to the social welfare value of "taking from society and giving back to society" and actively fulfilled its corporate social responsibility. Through volunteer service activities, disaster relief and medical services, and promoting regional social development and environmental protection activities, it has practiced the concept of creating and sharing happiness.

In order to more effectively leverage its local advantages and carry out public welfare undertakings in China, in November 2013, SK Group established the "Beijing Aisikai Happiness Charity Foundation" in Beijing. It is the first public welfare foundation established by a Korean company in China.

In 2019, SK Group and the China Guanghua Science and Technology Foundation of the Communist Youth League Central Committee jointly launched the Happiness Alliance project, which is based on cooperation and resource sharing among stakeholders such as government, enterprises, and social organizations, and continuously solves social problems through innovative ways.

SK Group and the State-owned Assets Supervision and Administration Commission of the State Council jointly carried out research on social value topics and established the "Corporate Social Value Laboratory" in 2020, which is committed to promoting social value theory and case studies and establishing a social value measurement and evaluation system that conforms to China's national conditions.

SK Group also pays attention to environmental issues and is committed to building a beautiful home. In July 2021, SK Group released the "2021 Sustainable Management Report", which includes ESG (environment, society, governance) business results and sustainable management strategy-SK's New Journey for Tomorrow. The report shows that SK Group created more than one trillion won (about US$870 million) in social value in 2020. Among them: indirect economic contribution of 942.1 billion won (about US$820 million), business social results of 84.4 billion won (about US$73.417 million), and social contribution of 12.6 billion won (about US$10.958 million), an increase of 14.3% over the previous year.

In his speech at the release of the report, SK Group Chairman Chey Tae-won said, “Now is the time to fundamentally think about the role of companies and how to adapt to new social demands.” “SK will also become a trusted partner by solving various social issues and opening up a sustainable future through activities based on new entrepreneurship such as ESG management.”

SK Group has been deeply rooted in the Chinese market for 30 years. During this period, its efforts in corporate social responsibility and public welfare are obvious to all, and it has also won many recognitions from all walks of life in China. Since 2007, SK has joined hands with the Central Committee of the Communist Youth League to donate funds to build the "SK Ecological Forest", a sand and dust prevention forest belt in the Kubuqi Desert in Inner Mongolia, making great contributions to improving the local ecological environment. The project won the "Best Corporate Public Welfare Project Innovation Award" issued by the Beijing Times. In 2008, the Chinese Red Cross awarded SK Group the "China Red Cross Medal of Philanthropy". In 2010, at the "China 2010 Corporate Innovation Annual Conference and Low-Carbon Economic Development Summit Forum", SK Group won the "2010 China Low-Carbon Innovation Enterprise Award". In 2019, SK Group won the "Most Influential Responsible Brand Award" awarded by the China Social Responsibility Hundred People Forum. From 2015 to 2020, SK Group won the CSR Model Enterprise Award for Korean Enterprises in China from the Korean Embassy in China for 6 consecutive years.

Over the past 30 years, SK Group has grown hand in hand with the Chinese market through thick and thin. SK Group firmly believes that as friendly neighbors separated by a narrow strip of water, peaceful coexistence and win-win cooperation between China and South Korea are in the common interests of the two peoples and are also the common goals of the two governments, enterprises and all sectors of society. Therefore, SK Group has consistently made unremitting efforts to deepen China-South Korea people-to-people exchanges, promote China-South Korea economic and trade exchanges, and promote economic development and social progress in the two countries, and will continue to make greater contributions to the development of China-South Korea friendly relations.