Alex Jensen: It’s Thursday December 2^nd, you’re listening to Koreabizcast with the KBLA. I’m your host, Alex Jensen. And as we’re in the midst of what they call awards season, it was a fitting time for the Korean German Chamber of Commerce and Industry to recently hold its annual Innovation Awards. I had the honor of hosting the event which included a live startup pitch competition, and a keynote speech followed by Q&A on the role of artificial intelligence in business and beyond. Shortly we’ll be hearing from the President and CEO of the Chamber, with today’s episode brought to you by Eastpoint Partners, offering an unparalleled Asia wide network of relationships with corporates, governments, and investors.

Alex Jensen: Well, leading the Korean-German Chamber of Commerce and Industry or KGCCI means working with some of Germany’s biggest names in the business world from automotive to cutting edge innovations to finance, it also means being based in what’s considered one of the world’s most innovative countries. Let’s see how the experience matches the expectation with Dr. Martin Henklemann. President and CEO of the KGCCI, thank you very much for joining us.

Dr. Martin Henklemann: Thank you very much for having me, Alex. Pleasure.

Alex Jensen: And let’s get a bit of background on Dr. Henklemann. Then and how you ended up in Korea?

Dr. Martin Henklemann: Yeah, thank you very much. I’m kind of a Cold War child from a city which is in a very west of Mönchen, and Mönchen very west of Germany. It’s called Mönchengladbach, mainly known for a good football club know, very good field hockey team. And then kind of came from there, studied a law in Germany and France and worked as a lawyer afterwards. Then, some years of experience in Brussels and Berlin. We have worked quite a lot with international companies and for international associations or internationally active associations, and federation’s and at some point, 2014. I joined the AHK network, this network of German chambers abroad AHK network. We have 140 offices around the world in more than 90 countries and started my first position was in Tunisia and then I went to the Philippines and now I’m very delighted to be in Korea.

Alex Jensen: Where does the doctor come in?

Dr. Martin Henklemann: Oh, the doctor comes in from a passion for international law, actually, and I wrote my thesis on International Maritime Law and International Trade Law, it was mainly about the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea. And this was quite a quite an interesting thing of passion, which I took from my party from my year in France, when I did international law there, something I did and then, I did this then as a as a PhD thesis I wrote in tubing, which was my first university then Aix-en-Provence in France and then Heidelberg,

Alex Jensen: And without legal background, is it particularly helpful now in this role? Or what would you say from your past is something that becomes most relevant when you’re leading a Chamber of Commerce?

Dr. Martin Henklemann: I think this this law background is very, very helpful in the sense of to put context to things and have a very structured approach to working. We, I mean, besides this, I think a benefit quite a lot of from this time as a lawyer because I was counseling companies. And I think this is very important that you have this experience as well and understanding how companies need help with regard to certain topics and as a lawyer, you learn this as a kind of a topic related to law questions, but then when you are consultant in the environment of Brussels, you learn how to help support them when it comes to tackle European issues. And then I think a second element besides this law approach, and particularly this experience of counseling companies, is this experience I had with a with a large federation, and the German Insurance Association and this idea of how to work within an association to find common understanding on points and we were an association which had voluntarily memberships so you learn also to take care of your members and how important it is to include them in the process of opinion building and to understand what they need and cater to their needs. So, I think there are different aspects that come all together and now a positive third big, biggest point is also from this time as lawyer and particularly as doing advocacy in Brussels and in Berlin, in dealing with governments and presenting ideas to governments and dealing with administration is something I think which is very helpful. I can use a lot or have been using a lot while working for the Chambers abroad.

Alex Jensen: In terms of the Korea part of the equation, you’re still fairly new here. Unlike others, it’s been a distorted view of the country that you’ve had, because of the whole global situation in the last couple of years. But how does Korea feel different from other countries you’ve worked in?

Dr. Martin Henklemann: I mean, this is a very unique country. It’s a very extraordinary experience, so far, it has been so far. I think it’s kind of the fifth, fourth country, fifth country I’m living in or even more but take longer stays in countries like five, six months, but kind of movie with the family here. It’s very interesting because it’s technologically, technologically so advanced, it’s very well organized, I find, I love the very good infrastructure when it comes to transport in the city, you have to subway but also driving outside. Seoul, you can drive everywhere, and you’ll find very good motorways. This is extraordinary. And it’s a little bit of pity at the moment, of course with everything due to COVID, many things you can’t do, or you cannot benefit so much from it like some of the cultural aspects, concerts etc. I’ve been a little bit reluctant to use to go there. Looking forward to benefit much more from this side as well or going to the stadiums and see you baseball game etc. I have been a bit reluctant as well to do this with my with my children, but it’s something I’m looking forward to.

Alex Jensen: Yeah, you mentioned Borussia, mentioned Mönchengladbach before. You have to pick your team in Korea. Maybe next season we can chance to do that. Although we still have the closing of the K-League season coming up. We’ve got actually this weekend the title is going to be decided. And Borussia Mönchengladbach, it’s a green color if I remember rightly, is that correct?

Dr. Martin Henklemann: Very good. Yeah, exactly. It’s green, black, white. Green is exactly the color you normally associate with, but Borussia Mönchengladbach. Thank you.

Alex Jensen: So, if that’s the case that the green in Korea is Jumbo Hyundai motors, although it’s a much brighter green, then you might be used to but still, they could be about to be named champions for the fifth time running this weekend so that there could be a moment for you?

Dr. Martin Henklemann: It would be probably good to take to pick this time a team that has a chance to win because Mönchengladbach hasn’t won any championship of 20 years. So probably good to up this time for team with real realistic chances to bring home trophies.

Alex Jensen: Yeah, well, I feel the same as a Crystal Palace fan from the UK.

Dr. Martin Henklemann: Oh, yah, it’s been suffering a lot as well, I guess.

Alex Jensen: Coming back to the KGCCI, and its particular role here in Korea, obviously. What do you see that as being building on some of the points you made before about what your experience brings to that?

Dr. Martin Henklemann: I mean, KGCCI has been here for 40 years has been working hard for 40 years has developed its footprint. And I think this is very, very positive. We are the largest, the second largest Chamber here and bilateral Chamber in the country with about 500 members. And we have been kind of growing together with the growing exchange. And with the whole with the growing environment between Korea and Germany, there are so many ties between our countries and business and everything which is business related has been growing strongly as well during the last particularly during the last 10 years with the free trade agreement between the European Union and Korea has been very beneficial for both sides. And at the Chamber is a big, big kind of stakeholder in this it’s an, it’s a part of it. It’s pushing forward and of course, contributing did, it just looks on trade fairs we have been supporting for many years to Korean companies go to Germany for trade fairs but much more important as well. We have been hosting and receiving many, many delegations during the last 40 years and have been I think, uncountable numbers of b2b meetings have been set up through the Chamber in the last 40 years. And when the pandemic came, of course, we changed many of these things to virtual events and virtual b2b. So, the Chamber has developed as well with the challenges we have seen and besides this, of course, the team has been very active as well, when it came to political visits and kind of giving the political visits which was not organized by the Chamber but giving it an economic aspect, we have been supporting there a lot that politicians also see the importance of the economic side between our two, and country, countries. And, of course, we, I mean, when we look forward, it’s also we want to continue this, and I’ve been quite busy weeks at the moment, but also with other events like, the Innovation Awards, and we can look on this little bit more detail. And we have a Women Empowerment program. We have been supported for many years, we have been setting up and organizing for many, many years now. This design important elements of our work. And one point we also want to get more involved in this is kind of giving our advice and sharing our insights and experience from our companies when it comes to how we can strengthen also on the legal pays on the free trade agreement or developing the free trade agreement. So how can we strengthen this, and we would like to share our insights and experience they are there as well.

Alex Jensen: Well, I wonder how useful it is for you to be in this role when you’ve got such huge brand names to work with. I bumped into briefly at the Seoul Mobility Show, just before we come on to the Innovation Awards. And there you had among the very few foreign car manufacturers actually on display, sandwiched between these huge booths for Hyundai and Kia, you also had some really impressive, what was it? Porsche? You had Audi, BMW. I think was Mercedes there as well, it must have been. Yeah, I mean, it’d be weird not to Mercedes there. But I’m just struggling to recall actually seeing much of them. I think the only other big foreign name was Maserati. So, it was very German influenced outside of the Korean company. So that must make your life a lot easier when you got those kinds of names to discuss?

Dr. Martin Henklemann: Yes, of course, it’s very positive that the German companies have been here for a very long time and that they are very present to constitute situation and that they show their commitment to the country by investing here and being here and we see some strong investment in many fields at the moment, for example, yesterday was at a groundbreaking from Shankar and the Innovation Awards, we are not one of the large investments from Henkel company here and as the from NIVEA, the accelerator here, there are lots of great examples. And it’s always difficult when you start with mentioning some of them, you, you miss the others, but just to give some, some examples. And this is excellent that these companies here are so active, and there are some points where we can support them, as well as the Chamber. But we also hear from for the many, many companies which are mainly on B2B which we normally don’t see. But they are very important as well for the for the link for the ties between our countries because this might be the German SMEs that don’t have a big branch here, but they still need to reach out to their Korean counterparts and particularly in a time of pandemic. I think the role of a Chamber is so important that we are here when people cannot travel. But still, we can help and support the companies into both directions.

Alex Jensen: Well, if there is another German brand listening right now. And you’re thinking, why wasn’t I mentioned? Well, here’s a great opportunity. You’re welcome to come on Koreabizcast and share your story. And one way to do that is through KBLA directly if you find us on LinkedIn, but another way is through the Chamber, I’m sure Dr. Henklemann, that you’d be happy to steer them away as well. So that’s something we can look forward to. And in fact, we’ll be starting, I think pretty soon with the winners of some of these innovation awards. That was how I was introduced to you very recently I had the honor of hosting the ceremony the year before with your predecessor. And it was really nice to meet you this time around. Dr. Henklemann. Can you tell us because I obviously know some of these answers but for people who are not familiar what the Innovation Awards are all about and why they’re so important?

Dr. Martin Henklemann: Innovation Awards which was done for the seventh time. This year is an A wat an event that honors the innovative, innovation cooperation between Korean and German companies and their developments, and the focus is really on Korean, German companies cooperation and there has to be linked to both countries and we award prizes in innovation in business innovation in digitalization and innovation and sustainability. And we think it is so important to do this because besides all the classical cooperation we have there’s also lots of innovation in our relation and we want to showcase these, these examples. And if you look on the winners this year with Kakao Enterprise for Innovation in Business and dSPACE Korea for Innovation and Digitalization and Henkel Korea for Innovation and Sustainability, I think we, you see that they are big names and perhaps not so known names that got the prize this there, they became laureates this this year. And it shows also the wide range of a field from which companies in Korean Germany where they cooperate and where they have innovation, I think it’s more consumer goods and the spaces and autonomous driving and automotive sector and Kakao Enterprise, I think I don’t want to explain to the Korean audience for their, for the great footprint they have and perhaps to just to add on and I think this year for the first time, we also had an a pitching competition for German companies that want to go to Korea and present their goods or their services. And I think was very good, good innovation for our own innovation award format with a very interesting company ProGlove, that one with a glove that has a scanner for packages, etc. for barcodes in the glove integrated, very helpful and particularly helpful probably in the country of E-commerce like here.

Alex Jensen: Yeah, I love that presentation with the Glove. Everything was so positive that night. But for me, actually hosting and moderating and then overseeing the live voting during the pitch event. It was so exciting, and it was a massive wake up call, I think for anyone who’s doing a pitch, the importance of clarity, and making sure the audience who may not be well versed with the technology can understand exactly how your product or your solution is going to, to work, because we were really strict with the time and with the follow up questions. And yeah, it was really successful. Do you think that’s something that is going to be able to continue in the future that that live pitching?

Dr. Martin Henklemann: Yes, I’m very positive about this. We spoke with the German accelerator which is a program that kind of German programs supported by the German Ministry for Economic Affairs and Energy program that kind of pre-selected these three companies that participated. And we I spoke with them, beginning of this week and they were very positive about this. And we one of the elements of our conversation was also that we continue and perhaps even strengthen this cooperation for next year’s award. And I think it’s very positive. And I had the same impression that people could vote live in the room. All this was a nice and nice additional element, particularly in a time when you have many other elements not possible due to the fact that they are Corona restrictions. And so, you need to find other elements to get the audience involved, let’s say this way.

Alex Jensen: Yeah. And it was, by the way, just really great to have an event where it felt just about normal. Obviously, there were precautions being taken and there were masks still visible. But it felt like, it wasn’t so different to some of the events before the pandemic. So, congratulations on actually pulling that off.

Dr. Martin Henklemann: I think thank you very much. And we were very strict, of course, following the rules, and totally, totally sure. But on the other side, yeah, we will have very happy that we could put through and thanks for helping us with your great MC activities there.

Alex Jensen: Absolute pleasure. And I think, actually, you know, it was just serendipitous, but it may bear fruit for a lot of future discussions on this podcast platform because as I said, there’s a lot of business stories that you’re connected with that we can follow up on in the future. And I look forward to that. Speaking of the future, what areas of business do you see as being most important between Korea and Germany going forward?

Dr. Martin Henklemann: There are many fields which are very promising on the one hand side, if you look on our exchange of 30 billion last year, accumulated volume of trade exchange, you see that we have to take into account the industry and the sectors and service sector which are already active which comes to our exporting importing in both direction of consumer goods and also the automotive part plays an important role or to mobile, etc. But if you look down on the kind of how these sectors develop and then you speak about autonomous driving when it comes to mobility, and it comes to how we green the mobility. We speak about the e-mobility or hydrogen elements. And so, these are important things, how kind of the classical sector of our business relation will have to develop and they are already developing because particularly, the cooperation between two high tech countries like Germany and Korea, Korea and Germany, think it’s sure that many of these kinds of most recent developments they show here, they will show we will be showcased in our relation and there are lots of joint ventures going on. And besides this, of course, we there’s always these, these kinds of the new sectors pushing in much more, we see a strong potential for cooperating more in the field of renewable energy when it comes to renewable energy, production of energy, we see hydrogen cooperation. And we have been doing a large event on this last in October, also following all the regulations, and we hope that we can do more larger event and the next year. And this is one another field and the Chamber is very active to holds the Korean German, German Korean energy Secretariat with many, many of this this topic when it comes to renewable energy. And when it also comes to promising new sectors, I think, let’s see how we can learn from each other when it comes to E-commerce and ways kind of more in the service sector or ways to do E-commerce, things very, very interesting to look on as well. We also have to see on the kind of the serve generation Germany and Korea has issues with the generated with a population that gets older that grows older. The average is more than 40, I think in both countries now. So, we have also pointed to look at as well, how can modern technology help elder people to still participate in the life and the opportunities that that modern life offers? I think they can be much of cooperation in this field as well. And then I think startups look on in both directions. And I think many of them will bring up ideas and that we don’t do not even anticipate at the moment. And once again, the cooperation between two high tech countries, two OECD countries, Korea and Germany is very promising that these modern technologies or modern services will be introduced there and use in between the two countries.

Alex Jensen: And we’ve also seen Germany enter new political waters slightly shifting to the left in a post Angular Merkel era, which is strange to think of, she’s become just part of the German global image, I think, having been in power for so long. And then at the same time, Korea with shorter presidential terms, obviously, just meaning that Moon Jae-in will be replaced after March’s election, that do these kinds of new political waters affect anything? Does it trickle down into the trade and business environment that you deal with?

Dr. Martin Henklemann: I do anticipate some changes, particularly on the on the German side. First of all, it’s really interesting, it’s almost awkward to think that there’s a generation of people that voted this time for the election that cannot really imagine a time that Angela Merkel was not chancellor and 16 years more. And that’s quite a while. So, where people for the first time voting and that haven’t been really aware of any anything, anyone before. So that’s one point and there will be lots of changes. I think the positive thing is that German politics are quite stable. And if you see now that the probable the next chancellor very probably will be the vice chancellor from the current government. That means already that there is some stability. But as you said, the government will be a little more middle left, perhaps you can say. And with this, we already see in the coalition agreement, several aspects that might be a little bit more emphasized than what we would have expected the government is led by the Christian Democrats. What we see is a strong emphasis when it comes to greening the economy to obligations for companies to do more here. Also, the question of how much the government is willing to invest in supporting the transformation to greening everything, CO2 reduction, CO2 carbon neutrality is a big, big issue. Digitalization would have been an issue ultimately other government. But I think that there’s this big push for kind of putting everything more than any green perspective, particularly as the green as the second largest part in this three-party coalition had a strong footprint here and on the one hand side, yes, strong stability when it comes to Europe is important for us, the European Union is very important for us, international trade is important for us. But I think we will see more this kind of emphasize always when we negotiate Free Trade Agreements, or when we do now agreements, and we deal with other countries that the government will always ask, and how is your kind of your green footprint as an economy or as a government? How is, labor standards? How is human rights situation in your country? This is of course, many of these issues are less relevant for Korea, but particularly the issue of greening the economy. Yes, this is something which can be also very good can become more relevant in our bilateral relations. But on the other side, there’s a commitment for international trade for bilateral or multilateral agreements for rule-based trade. There’s this strong commitment to values to human rights in general. And they are German government mentions Korea, South Korea, even in the in the agreement under 77 pages and Korea as mentioned once in there, in the context of kind of strong ally in the Pacific region and we are very positive and very happy to see this.

Alex Jensen: Yeah. And it’s really useful and if not very interesting to get that kind of context into what’s happening politically elsewhere. We’re going to be seeking to provide that sort of context into what happens next here in Korea as well in the coming months. Thank you so much, by the way for taking the time. It’s been wonderful to catch up.

Dr. Martin Henklemann: Thank you very much, Alex, It was very delighted to speak to you, very interesting. Thank you.

Alex Jensen: Well, as well as extending our gratitude to Dr. Martin Henklemann, President and CEO of the Korean-German Chamber of Commerce and Industry. I want to thank you also for being with us today as well as Eastpoint Partners for making today’s episode possible. And see you again tomorrow.