A Tough Competition
“What was that guy earlier? The one talking about Korea University and opportunities and all that.”
“Yeah. The way he said it was kind of gross.”
The earlier conversation definitely had an unpleasant edge to it.
The fact that people were still talking about it even after all the introductions were over and everyone had taken their seats said enough.
And the fact that even these engineers thought something was off made it feel even more suspicious.
“Don’t worry about it. They’re not even in the same field as us. With that kind of petty, defensive mindset, they won’t last long anyway.”
I bounced back emotionally faster than I expected.
Simply put, I’d never seen people who acted like that rise to the top.
In most industries, survival depended on cooperation. If all you had was greed, so clouded by jealousy that you couldn’t work with others, collaboration became impossible.
“Participants in this year’s startup competition technology division, welcome.”
Before I had time to dwell on it any further, the competition officially began.
At once, every team that had been chatting quietly in their seats went silent.
There were greetings from high-ranking officials in the organizing department, encouragement from past winners, and various other formalities, and only when people had begun to feel the first stirrings of boredom did the actual presentations start.
“Then, we’ll begin with QF Technology’s presentation.”
The company name was familiar enough that I felt a little pleased.
The CEO who had been the first to speak to me stepped up onto the stage, and our whole team recognized him and applauded warmly.
“Good afternoon. I’m Cha Yonghwan of QF Technology.”
CEO Cha Yonghwan’s presentation was exceptionally polished.
It was probably most accurate to call it textbook.
He laid out the current state of the manufacturing market, explained the pain point he had identified there, and then walked them through how his company’s product would solve it.
“That’s a solid idea, right?”
“If they’re targeting manufacturing, the unit price should be high enough to make it profitable, no?”
“But it’s also full of old hands, so maybe it’d be hard to break into the market with new clients?”
We all listened intently and shared our thoughts as they came.
Since they were using such interesting technology, I think we were all curious and naturally started throwing out questions.
“Manufacturing is one of the hardest markets to enter for the first time. How did you overcome that barrier?”
The questions we wanted to ask were all asked for us by the judges.
“QF Technology’s angel investor was connected to HH Construction. That allowed us to introduce our technology to the construction industry first, and after receiving a good reputation there, we were able to generate additional sales.”
The answer was so clean that even the judges seemed to nod along.
Even to us, it sounded like a business that had been prepared extremely well.
“They’re really good from the very first presentation.”
“Yeah, the quality of the pitch is definitely different.”
My teammates and I were all impressed.
After all, our own product was too familiar to us, while any new technology naturally felt fresh.
That familiarity also made us a little uneasy about whether we could actually take the grand prize.
But the expression on Badugi’s face on my phone screen was anything but peaceful.
Aren’t you going to listen to the other teams?
Do I have to? You’re the one who needs to do well anyway.
Ah. So that’s why you look so relaxed. Because you’re not listening.
I did listen. Why, are you nervous?
He had listened, and he was still that calm?
I stopped the conversation and stared only at the screen behind the stage.
CEO Cha Yonghwan’s confident expression filled the display.
But that confidence wavered a little with the judges’ next question.
“So there really are no competitors overseas? You make it sound as if there aren’t even any in Korea.”
CEO Cha blinked once or twice before answering.
“There are no competitors using exactly the same technology.”
“There are places using fairly similar technology, though. I remember their market share in North America being high enough that the U.S. market shook quite a bit after they went public.”
Ah. So there really were formidable competitors overseas.
“The competitor you’re referring to, MK Technology, uses a completely different approach. They use sensors that identify targets in 2D rather than 3D, so their accuracy isn’t very high, and there was also some controversy recently because their parent company forced subcontractors into contracts in order to increase market share.”
It was a pretty detailed answer.
To me, it sounded quite convincing.
But it didn’t seem to satisfy the judges.
“Do you have any data comparing the accuracy of your technology with that competitor’s?”
“Not exactly. In the first place, they use a different technology,”
“You say it’s a different technology, but from my perspective, it looks like the same thing. And I suspect that’s how consumers would see it too.”
I thought the judge’s attitude was strange, so I asked Badugi right away.
Isn’t that judge just nitpicking?
But Badugi didn’t immediately agree with me.
From his point of view, he might think QF lied about having no competitors.
So he really had less empathy than I did.
If it’s a completely different technology, you can say there are no competitors. And QF is technically more advanced too.
It’s still the same thing—“technology that uses image analysis to assemble and manage machinery.” And they can’t clearly prove whether it’s more advanced.
Still, it seems a little unfair to get treated like liars.
Bad luck. They were too quick to mention another company’s contract renewals when there wasn’t even any official position on it.
Badugi kept listing one disappointing point after another in QF Technology’s presentation.
From my point of view, those were all trivial things. But from the judges’ perspective, they were apparently exactly the kind of weak spots worth pressing on, which made the whole thing feel a little bizarre.
It’s a good technology. It’s a shame it’s getting underestimated like this.
Don’t start talking about being underestimated in a competition where you’re literally supposed to compare teams. You should be praying you don’t get stuck with a judge like that too.
It felt strange, hearing Badugi tell me to pray.
Still, I didn’t say anything else and instead kept listening more closely to QF Technology’s Q&A.
I wanted to get a rough sense of the kinds of questions that came up so I could prepare answers for my own presentation.
“What do you think are the biggest problems when expanding overseas?”
“If we’re talking about overseas expansion, logistics due to the product’s size would be a challenge. But if we can secure a factory site locally, then we could manufacture the product on location and…”
The rest of the Q&A went extremely smoothly.
Listening to the next teams after that made it even clearer just how well QF Technology had prepared.
But then again, that was probably part of the role luck played in competitions like this.
“Mr. DragonEye, please go back to slide four.”
“Yes, of course.”
“From these research materials, I believe the results from this year were different. Didn’t you check the one the Ministry of Food and Drug Safety conducted this year?”
It was obvious that every participating company was on a different level from the hackathon.
The problem was that the judges had become just as formidable.
DragonEye’s CEO, who had been so eager to lean on “luck,” was getting shredded in plain sight.
“CEO, please come this way.”
I was watching the DragonEye representative struggle when a staff member quietly approached from behind.
My turn to present was coming up.
“Siwon, fighting.”
“CEO, do great out there!”
My teammates whispered encouragement and looked my way, and I gave them a calm nod without showing any sign of tension.
“Next, we’ll begin TA Medical’s presentation.”
I smiled faintly, watched the large countdown timer on the screen tick down, and began to speak.
“Good afternoon. I’m Kim Siwon of TA Medical.”
Fortunately, I wasn’t nervous at all.
I had already given this presentation many times before—first in front of professors, and in my previous life, in front of investors.
“The importance of early diagnosis is clear even if you simply look at the survival rate by stage for lung cancer on the screen.”
The only difference was that I had added one message: an AI for patients.
Now our product was officially AI that reduced doctors’ workloads and helped with early diagnosis for patients.
It sounded like a small change, but the impact seemed to be greater than I’d expected.
“I know people around me who suffered because their cancer was found too late, so it’s amazing to hear an AI like this is coming out.”
If that was the first sentence in the Q&A, then the rest was already obvious.
“In this product’s case, are there no competitors either in Korea or overseas?”
“There are AIs with similar technology and similar goals. But their accuracy is below 80 percent, which is why they haven’t been commercialized in practice.”
“You said the internal accuracy is around how much?”
“Based on internal testing, the lung cancer screening accuracy is 99 percent.”
Since it was a product that had already earned emotional sympathy first, even the usual Q&A unfolded in a positive atmosphere.
It wasn’t the kind of stance that said, Let’s see what nonsense you’re talking about. It was more like, Could something like that really be commercialized?
That was the advantage of the medical field.
As long as you’re alive, anyone can become a customer.
“It looks like veterinary medicine has already signed contracts here and there. What about the medical side? Are there no contracts yet?”
“The approval process for commercial use is still underway.”
“Looks like almost all the prize money will go into that side, then, right?”
“I think that’ll probably be the case.”
There was one thing I felt from the judges in this year’s startup competition.
Expectation.
There were no questions about industry conditions like, “You don’t have a doctor among your members, so wouldn’t it be hard to commercialize this?”
There was only pure expectation and curiosity about the product itself.
“Yes. If there are no more questions, CEO Kim Siwon may step down.”
So I also stepped down from the stage with confidence and rejoined my teammates.
“Why are they asking our team so many questions? I mean—asking you?”
“You did great. You’re probably pretty shaken, huh?”
“I think they’re just looking for things to pick apart.”
But amusingly, my teammates were feeling a vague sense of anxiety over the sheer number of questions.
Yeah. That made sense.
I flashed a bright smile and shared my instinct with them.
“The judges are just that excited. It means there’s no problem with us placing.”
Nobody seemed to believe me right away.
That was fine.
After all, there was only one team left to present before the awards ceremony began.
“Hss. I think we might actually have a shot at the grand prize.”
“Wouldn’t silver be more likely? There are plenty of businesses out there with profits already guaranteed, unlike us.”
“From a company’s perspective, they might invest more value in a business like ours that seems to be pursuing the greater good than in one whose profits are already locked in.”
And with that, all the chaotic presentations finally came to an end, and the awards ceremony drew near.
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