Choi Tae-won between Mun and Andong factory… The big picture there was cousin Choi Chang-won

SK Bioscience (SK Bio), a subsidiary of SK Group, is promoting listing on the KOSPI next month. A stock report was submitted to the Financial Services Commission, and general subscriptions were received on the 9th to 10th of the following month. The investment banking (IB) industry estimates SK Bio’s corporate value at 3 to 5 trillion won. Following SK Biopharm, which was listed last year, SK is facing another successful IPO.

The reason this company has recently received attention is that it is the only Korean company that has a full-stage lineup such as development, production, and distribution of Corona 19 vaccine. As of the 13th, all of the vaccines produced in Korea, which have been approved by the Ministry of Food and Drug Safety, such as AstraZeneca and NovaVax, will be shipped from SK Bio’s Andong factory.

President Moon Jae-in also visited the Andong factory in Gyeongbuk on the 20th of last month. President Moon said, “I would like to express my special thanks” to SK Group Chairman Choi Tae-won.

However, the person who raised SK Bio was Choi Chang-won (57), vice chairman of SK Discovery, the cousin of Chairman Choi. Vice-Chairman Choi is the largest shareholder of SK Discovery with a 40.2% stake. SK Bio is dominated by SK Discovery (33.5%) → SK Chemicals (98%). Vice Chairman Choi Chang-won was not in Andong that day.

Regarding this, an official of SK Group said, “From the point of view of my younger brother (Vice Chairman Choi Chang-won), it was determined that the group’s head brother (Chairman Choi Tae-won) would be present.”

SK was founded by the late Chairman Choi Jong-Geon, and his younger brother, the late Chairman Choi Jong-hyun, took over. Currently, Chairman Choi Tae-won, the eldest son of Chairman Choi Jong-hyun, oversees the SK Group, and Vice Chairman Choi Chang-won, the third son of Chairman Choi Jong-gun, is in charge of SK Discovery management.

The case of SK Bio’s Andong Plant also tells the relationship between the two, but it is also a cross-section of Choi’s reclusive management style.

When the SK Wyverns professional baseball team, which became a hot topic recently, was sold, he, the owner, did not express any opinions. When I was in charge of the team in early 2014, “Chairman Tae-won Choi asked me to take over the baseball team. I am a big fan with a lot of shortcomings, but I will see and hear a lot and do my part well.”

He joined Sunkyung Industries (currently SK Chemicals) in 1994 and has been working for SK for 28 years, but there have been few media interviews. The reporter once met Vice Chairman Chang-won Choi at the SK E&C office building in Sunhwa Tower, Jung-gu, Seoul 11 ​​years ago. The door of the lobby lift opened, and someone stood alone with a leather bag. Usually, when the owner and manager of a large company is looking for a company, it is common to go with an executive secretary. He was the Vice Chairman of SK E&C at the time.

As soon as he saw his unique curly hair, he noticed that he was Vice-Chairman Choi and handed him a business card while greeting him. However, he only bowed his head without answer. Then disappeared into the conference room.

Because of her reclusive style, she sometimes gets glare. In the event of a large-scale case such as the humidifier disinfectant incident, he was asked to attend the National Assembly hearing late, and only lowered his head after the prosecution’s investigation was over.

However, as a manager, it is a comment from inside and outside the SK Group that it is getting a high passing score. The vaccine business is a prime example. Vice-Chairman Choi has been drawing a blueprint for the bio business 15 years ago. In 2006, it made a large-scale vaccine investment plan and invested 500 billion won in 2008. In 2012, the world-class vaccine factory (L House) was built in Andong.

Due to the nature of the bio industry, which requires long-term investment and research, it is difficult to achieve results without the decision of the owner to bear the loss in the development period. Vice Chairman Choi Chang-won’s management ability, which has been evaluated as “sincerity, aggressive, and has a strong drive to deal with bad things,” (Chief Jae-won, senior vice chairman of SK Group) is clearly revealed through the vaccine business.

His core task before investing in bio was planning. From the time he joined the company, he continued to work in planning by digging a well at a company. The bio-industry is a new business he chose after long-term planning experience.

When working as vice president of SK Chemicals, Vice Chairman Chang-won Choi once compared it to “planning work is like a helicopter.” “The plan is to look at the whole from a high place and settle down exactly where you want,” he said. “The company can achieve results only when a new business is successfully planted.”

Since then, it has set a milestone for the K-vaccine in a relatively short period of time. SK Bio is developing two COVID-19 vaccine candidates (NBP2001 and GBP510) independently, among which GBP510 attracted global attention by attracting support from the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation. The Association for Infectious Disease Prevention and Innovation (CEPI), supported by the foundation, selected GBP510 as the target of support for the next-generation Corona 19 vaccine development project and provided clinical research and development expenses of 10 million dollars (approximately 11 billion won).

It also oversees vaccine distribution. SK Bio is in charge of distribution and storage of the two vaccines produced in Korea, as well as the Janssen and Pfizer vaccines imported from overseas and the vaccines supplied by Cobax Facility.

When SK Bio goes public, Vice Chairman Choi is expected to gain enormous stock valuation gains. SK Chemicals, the largest shareholder of SK Bio, will be able to get 497.7 billion won immediately after listing based on the top of the range that the public offering hopes for. Through SK Discovery, the value of Vice Chairman Choi, who owns SK Chemicals, will also vertically rise. As of the end of last year, Vice Chairman Choi’s stake in SK affiliates was 5153 billion won.

Reporter Moon Hee-cheol [email protected]