Chuseok is Korea’s autumnal holiday, a time for sharing the year’s harvest together with family. It is the perfect time to offer gifts to family elders, business partners and anyone you’d like to be on extra good terms with -- or just to prove you’re now legitimately in the adulting phase of life. 1. Cash Who doesn’t love cash? Cash gifts are arguably the most preferred way of showing a person that you genuinely care in South Korea. Because by giving them the mon

Oscar winner Gwyneth Paltrow has become the face of Merz Aesthetics’ global campaign for its botulinum toxin product, Merz Korea said Friday. Paltrow has been using Xeomin for years before she agreed to become the ambassador for the wrinkle-removing neurotoxin, according to Merz Aesthetics.  This global campaign is built on Paltrow’s principles for beauty, which is that women should permit themselves to do whatever they need for their happiness. Paltrow will use the hashtag

Celltrion Group announced Friday it has established Celltrion Healthcare Holdings as a first step of its plan to merge three affiliates by the end of 2021. The creation of the holding company is required to materialize the merger plan in compliance with the legal standards for Monopoly Regulation and Fair Trade Act. The merger of Celltrion, Celltrion Pharma and Celltrion Healthcare has been widely expected since early this year. It will be a merger of the existing Celltrion Holdings, comprisi

There is a surge of movement from Korean telecommunications firms noticeably seeking to enter the digital health care market. KT on Friday said it has signed a memorandum of understanding with local gene sequencing company NGeneBio to jointly develop a personalized health care product based on genetic data analysis. Earlier in the week, KT also said that it will work together with Medical Partners Korea to launch an information and communication technology-based epidemic control system in Kaz

Merck has donated 25,000 euros ($29,000) to an Ansan, Gyeonggi Province, multicultural children care center, the Merck Korea said Thursday. The fund will be used, among other things, for a Korean-language tutor, a computer room and a multimedia facility, according to nonprofit organization Loving Neighbors. This was the first official activity undertaken by Kim Woo-kyu, the new managing director of Merck Korea, since taking post. Kim emphasized the importance

Samsung Biologics will contract develop Kanaph Therapeutics’ retinal disease treatment, the company announced Thursday. Kanaph’s KNP-301 is a C3bg Inhibitor-VEGF binder novel drug candidate that treats dry and wet macular degeneration, diabetic retinopathy and diabetic macular edema. Samsung Biologics will undertake all steps of the drug development, spanning cell line development, development process optimization and preclinical and clinical sample manufacturing. “For a b

Daewoong Pharmaceuticals and Medytox on Tuesday gave contrasting interpretations of the US International Trade Commission‘s announcement to review parts of the final initial determination. The USITC decided Monday to review parts of the FID, accepting respondent Daewoong’s notice of a “new factual development” regarding the trade secret misappropriation allegation levied by complainant Medytox. Since 2016, Medytox and Daewoong have been engaged in legal disputes over t

Samsung Biologics signed to contract manufacture AstraZeneca‘s biologics drug for its global distribution, the company said Tuesday. The size of the contract is $330,840,300, open to grow to $529,599,900 if demand grows for AstraZeneca’s product. This deal seals the letter of intention Samsung Biologics and AstraZeneca forged on June 23. The contract culmination date is tentatively written as the end of 2028. “This long-term partnership with Samsung Biologics strengthens our

GC Pharma, a blood plasma-derived medicine company, said Monday that it has administered its COVID-19 plasma treatment GC5131A to the first domestic patient for a phase 2 clinical trial. In Korea, professor Chung Jin-won of the division of infectious diseases at Chung-Ang University Hospital was the first to take on GC Pharma’s GC5131A pipeline for treatment of a COVID-19 patient on Saturday. This phase 2 trial will determine the right dosage for safe and efficacious use of GC5131A. It t

KT CEO Ku Hyeon-mo is pushing for the formation of a new global body to address pandemic preparedness utilizing information and communications technology, the South Korean mobile carrier said Sunday. At an event that took place Friday to commemorate the Broadband Commission’s 10th anniversary, Ku pitched the idea of an epidemic management working group in which global players could collaborate to fight future health care crises. The Broadband Commission is a 58-member group helmed by t

Samsung Biologics signed to contract develop Panolos Bioscience‘s novel anti-cancer drug candidate PB101, the company announced Thursday. Per contract, Samsung Biologics will be responsible for all steps of PB101’s development, including cell line development, preclinical and global clinical trials’ sample manufacturing and investigational new drug applications. Panolos Bioscience’s next-generation anti-cancer pipeline PB101 fights cancer by inhibiting the growth of tum

Samsung Display said Wednesday that its latest organic light-emitting diode displays can fold with the narrowest gap compared with any rival product around the world that is commercially available as a smartphone component. 　Through technology optimization, this new and enhanced display can withstand around 200,000 folds despite using ultrathin glass instead of colorless polyimide, Samsung Display said. 　Samsung Display’s 1.4R OLED displays are used in Samsung Electronics&rsq

  　Celltrion Group is expected to become the first Korean biologics drug company with an operating profit of over 1 trillion won ($850 million), financial data aggregator FnGuide projected Tuesday. 　To put things into perspective, in 2019 there were only six groups that had delivered such a performance: Samsung, SK, Hyundai Motor, Lotte, LG and GS. 　Celltrion Group is one of the few companies that has come out stronger from the unforeseen COVID-19 crisis. Comprising of biosimilars develop

　Seven South Korean pharmaceutical firms are conducting global clinical trials of their proposed COVID-19 treatments variably in the US, India, Russia, Mexico, the Philippines and South Africa -- with more destinations on the agenda. The reasons behind choosing to go overseas reflect where the need for COVID-19 treatment is most pressing, the companies told The Korea Herald. At their clinical trial destinations it is easier to find candidates to test the drugs on, due to the sheer number of c

LIG Nex1, an aerospace and defense company, donated some 1,000 everyday essential items to a Good Will Store in Daejeon, in hopes of softening the blow of the COVID-19 pandemic for disabled people. Full proceeds from the sales of these donated goods will be used to bolster the employment security of the disabled workers at Good Will Stores. LIG Nex1 said that this campaign attempts to foster responsible corporate culture based on voluntary participation from its employees. In other forms o

Jin, a 41-year-old mother of two kindergartners, has always questioned whether she wanted to put her children through cram schools. As a well-paid salary worker who followed the conventional path of education, Jin believes she was part of a “luckier” generation. She worries constantly about what new competition and challenges her children will face when it’s their turn. “While I still unconsciously think that becoming a doctor would be splendid and honorable, if my chil

An increasing number of consumers who purchased clothes through social media are reporting complaints of unshipped products and merchants suddenly vanishing altogether. According to Korea Consumer Agency on Friday, the state-run institute has received 657 cases seeking remedies for fraudulent fashion business practices on social media in the first half of 2020 -- a 38.9 percent on-year increase for the category. The most prevalent form of malpractice reported was no shipment upon payment, acco

Celltrion said Friday that it had confirmed the safety of COVID-19 antibody drug CT-P59 in healthy people through a domestic phase 1 trial involving 32 people. Once another clinical phase 1 trial targeting light-symptom COVID-19 patients wraps up, Celltrion plans to proceed to global phase 2 and 3 trials in as many as 12 nations targeting 500 patients. Clinical test designs for these global trials have already been submitted in seven countries, Celltrion said. Although the company refraine

SK Biopharmaceuticals is on track to conduct phase 3 clinical trials of its novel epilepsy treatment cenobamate in Korea, China and Japan. The company announced Thursday that its phase 3 clinical trial design was approved by Korean drug authorities Wednesday, to be carried out at Seoul National University Hospital. In China, it is awaiting approval from the National Medical Products Administration, after having made the application in June. In Japan, the company is readying the application t

LG Chem became the first company in Korea to fly an unmanned aerial vehicle using next-generation lithium-sulfur battery into the 22-kilometer-high stratosphere, the company said Thursday. The test flight, conducted on Aug. 30 jointly with Korea Aerospace Research Institute, flew the high-altitude solar unmanned aerial vehicle EAV-3 equipped with lithium-sulfur battery for a total of 13 hours. During the flight, EAV-3 was able to stably operate in the 12- to 22-kilometer-high stratosphere fo