Lee Dong-won, third from left, director at the Gwangju and South Jeolla Province regional headquarters of the Korea International Trade Association (KITA), poses with Teo Son, second from left, a partner in the Asia-Pacific region at MobilityFund, and Kim Duck-moh, third from right, president at Gwangju Institute of Green-Car Advancement, in the nation's southwestern city, Tuesday. Courtesy of KITA

The Korea International Trade Association (KITA) has teamed up with MobilityFund — a Germany-based venture capital — to support the sustainable growth of a mobility industrial complex in Korea's southwestern city of Gwangju, the association said Wednesday.

Under the partnership, promising startups and small to medium-sized enterprises at the Gwangju Future Car Industrial Complex will be able to receive support for their global expansion.

MobilityFund invests in future transportation.

KITA will partner with the Gwangju Green Car Promotion Agency and MobilityFund to support overseas expansion and marketing of mobility firms with huge growth potential there. MobilityFund supports car firms such as Daimler and Toyota.

"With the signing of the memorandum of understanding, we hope that promising companies in the Gwangju future car industrial complex will increase their competitiveness in the global market," said Lee Dong-won, director at KITA's Gwangju-South Jeolla Province regional headquarters.

"We will conduct a demonstration project in Vietnam in the first half of this year in collaboration with the Green Car Promotion Agency. We also plan to proceed through the fund, and in the second half of the year, promising firms selected by the agency will participate in German mobility-related exhibitions to discover new business opportunities together with the mobility fund."

The agency and the regional city government are accelerating the construction of an industrial base related to self-driving cars and future mobility to strengthen their role as a core base for the future car industry.