Some North Koreans participated in a monthslong startup nurturing program in Singapore last year, a move seen as Pyongyang's efforts to seek new business opportunities and obtain an additional source of foreign currency, according to a source in the city-state.

Four North Koreans belonging to the North's State Academy of Sciences took part in the program run by BASH for about four months starting in September 2015, said the source at Singapore's state-run venture capital company Infocomm Investments.

BASH, which stands for "Building Amazing Start-up Here," is an institute under Infocomm Investments that nurtures and incubates startups.

It provides a 3-month-long "accelerating" course aimed at helping startups get off the ground and an incubating course for those selected firms for up to some 7 months. Launched about two years ago, BASH offers mentoring, offices and other support aimed at helping small but promising companies.

The source told the foreign ministry's joint press corps that the North Koreans did not join the courses with their own business ideas but went through the entire process learning how to find and support promising startup companies and help them advance to the market with their final products.

He remembered that the North Koreans showed enthusiasm to study and showed fast learning capability but cited lack of language skills and ability to "translate thinking into the market" as their major weaknesses.

"They had two problems. No. 1 was language because not many spoke English. No. 2 was their ability to translate their thinking into the market," he said.

"They don't communicate with markets enough to be able to find out what is needed and to adjust, which was the reason why the (North) Korean startups can't compete."  (Yonhap)