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| Shin Hun-soo, CEO of Taeju Industry, right, gives a thumbs up along with German visitors at an invention exhibition at Nuremberg, Germany in this October 2015 photo. Courtesy of Taeju Industry Inc. |
By Kim Hyun-bin
A specially designed power strip ("multitap" in Korea) which makes use easier for handicapped and elderly people to unplug cords is gaining rapid recognition in Korea and overseas. The product is dubbed "Owl Click Tab" and with a slight push against the plug the cord pops out of the socket. The item was developed and patented by a local start-up company Taeju Industry Inc. in 2010 and has gone through numerous upgrades and versions throughout the years.
Shin Hun-soo, CEO of Taeju Industry first thought of the idea after witnessing his handicapped mother in-law struggle to pull out a plug.
"My mother-in-law was paralyzed in her right hand and foot so she had trouble pulling out the plug from a power socket. I thought it would make the world easier if a slight push against the plug could pop it out of the socket. I searched for the product both on and offline, but it was nowhere to be found, so I decided to develop it myself," Shin said during an interview with The Korea Times at his office in Seoul, Jan. 17.
In August 2010, Shin was chosen and received 10 million won from the Seoul Metropolitan Government as part of the youth entrepreneur's support project and was also able to receive an additional 150 million won for technical assurance for his patent being acknowledged as an innovative product, which funded the manufacture of the initial Owl Click Tab.
Even with a great innovative idea it took a great deal of time and effort to perfect and market the product.
"It took a long time to develop and promote the product, as we were oblivious to key business factors including marketing, market analysis, distribution, price setting and manufacture conditions," he said.
In 2016, Shin was lucky enough to be offered sell his device on a local home shopping network, which he thought could become a great opportunity to promote and sell its products, but little did he know, it would lead to a devastating catastrophe, which came close to putting his company close to bankruptcy due to miscalculations.
"We thought the home shopping was a great success as the products were selling like hot cakes, we were making sales worth 300 million won each hour. But little did we know, it almost led us to bankruptcy for every item we sold. We were in debt as we miscalculated the product cost, within six months we had an accumulated debt worth 1.1 billion won," Shin said.
Despite the losses, the company was lucky enough to enter the German market starting off with 1,000 cables in May 2016. Through word of mouth the product became known to the public and sold 150,000 via the QVC German home shopping channel in the course of just two broadcasts in 2018, the company said.
"In October 2018 an order for 200,000 came in. I didn't believe my ears as they usually only ordered a few thousand at a time. It was the first time a large order like this came through at the time, but again in early 2019 another order for 200,000 was placed. This year alone around 1 million are already scheduled to be shipped to Germany alone," he said.
After entering the German market, the Owl Click Tab gained popularity among Germany's disabled citizens as a must have product and was highly spoken of for its safety and convenience, according to the company.
Taeju Industry have been exporting its products to Germany and Indonesia, but plans to expand to other countries with a goal of selling its products in around 50 in the coming years.
Setting Germany as its base for Europe, Taeju Industry is seeking to open up markets in over a dozen neighboring European countries including France, Spain, Turkey and Russia.
"Expanding our market to China, the U.S., Japan and Southeast Asian countries will also be meaningful. This year we are developing power strips for China, which we believe will triple sales by 2021," the CEO said.
However, a major difficulty for the company are the different plug configurations used by other countries. The company has already developed plugs for some but is still seeking investors to mass produce and export to markets in North America, Europe and Southeast Asia.
"Unfortunately for us, all the countries surrounding Korea uses a different shape plug and that is why we are first targeting countries that uses the same design as Korea rather than planning to move on to other markets. We initially lacked research and development funds, but we are starting to find investors to fund the project," he said.
The company has come a long way from making only 30 million won in 2012 to generating 1.3 billion won last year in Korea alone.
The company expects sales of 30 billion won locally this year, more than doubling sales growth from last year.
But the largest sales growth within the country is expected to occur in 2022, as Taeju has already inked deals with construction companies to use the power strips at soon to be constructed apartment complexes around the country.
"The year 2022 will be a big year and we expect sales of 30 billion won in Korea alone. We have signed contracts with several apartment construction firms and are scheduled to install the power strips in soon to be built apartment complexes around the country, in which all sockets will use Owl Click Tabs," Shin said.
The Owl Click Tab is also equipped with two safety layers to prevent accidents especially for toddlers from inserting items into the sockets.
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| An Owl Click Tab mini scheduled to be released in March is equipped with high speed USB charging ports. Courtesy of Taeju Industry Inc. |
There are several different models of Owl Click Tab from a single socket to four and the company is currently in the process of launching a power strip in March that has high speed USB charging ports.
