Legacy clouds Ahn’s ambition

Ahn Cheol-soo, right, steps down from a platform after announcing he will run for the presidency in a press conference at the Salvation Army Art Hall, Seoul. / Yonhap

By Kang Hyun-kyung

Ahn Cheol-soo founded the anti-virus vaccine provider AhnLab in 1995 when he was 33, the same age at which his father opened a small hospital in an urban slum in Busan in 1963.

Ahn is portrayed as a successful start-up business leader. But some critics, like Hwang Jang-soo, challenge this notion, saying that he doesn’t deserve such a reputation. Hwang alleges that Ahn’s achievements are, at best, overstated. He even claimed that Ahn is not presidential material.

Unlike his father who recently ended his 49-year-long medical practice by closing his hospital, the younger Ahn has taken a very different career path, exploring several different fields of work. The Busan native was a medical doctor briefly in the early 1990s, but then developed anti-computer virus vaccines until the mid-2000s.

He now teaches students at the Seoul National University (SNU) Graduate School of Convergence Science and Technology as a professor.

Ahn, 50, is also active as a mentor for college students and recent graduates. He inspired young people to dream of a better future through a series of nationwide lectures held at several provincial universities.

He created the AhnLab eight years after he developed the anti-virus software, dubbed V3, the first of its kind in Korea, in 1988.

At that time, few people here were familiar with computer virus vaccines, probably because personal computers were not widely used.

Public awareness of anti-virus vaccines was still low in the mid-1990s when Ahn, along with two other key founding members, began the start-up business at a small office located on the second floor of a building in Seochodong, southern Seoul.

The two other founding members are Kim Hyun-sook, a former reporter for a computer magazine, and Koh Jung-han, a computer enthusiast who was eager to learn about the virus.

As there was virtually no demand for virus vaccines until the late 1990s, the founding members and staff who joined the company struggled to create profits.

It was the late 1990s when the anti-virus program began drawing public attention when the CIH virus attacked some 300,000 personal computers in 1999.

“The phones of the 40 staff members at the office rang endlessly all day as panicked computer users tried to get help from AhnLab experts to figure out how to troubleshoot the problem,” an unnamed staff-member of the company recalled in the book, titled “AhnLab, the Safest Name in the World.”

“We’ve got so many inquiry calls from people that even Ahn, who was then outside the company for work, couldn’t connect with his staff because all phones were busy. For a week, we couldn’t even find time to go to the rest room.”

It was nearly a decade after the CIH virus when AhnLab made headlines.

In July 2009, a virus, that infiltrated computers in a distributed denial of services (DDOS), paralyzed websites of major importance in the nation, including that of Cheong Wa Dae, the National Intelligence Service and the Ministry of National Defense.

AhnLab issued a timely, accurate analysis of the DDOS, and predicted when a second attack would come, which turned out to be correct.

This amazed the domestic and international media.

Criticism

When AhnLab drew the media headlines, founder Ahn was not there because he gave up his CEO position in 2005 to study in the United States, the second such time following a two-year degree program in business administration at the University of Pennsylvania in 1995.

Considering that only one out of 1,000 venture businesses survive, the anti-virus vaccine provider deserves the credit for becoming a successful start-up business. More than 600 staff members are now working for the firm. It also has overseas branches in several countries, including China and the United States.

AhnLab allowed Internet users to download the anti-virus vaccine for free, earning Ahn a reputation as a dedicated community builder.

Despite this, controversy erupted lately regarding whether he deserves credit for being a successful business leader or not because he sent out a signal that he would run in the presidential election.

Hwang Jang-soo, director of the Seoul-based think tank Institute for Future Studies, claimed that the free downloads of V3 was a business tactic, dismissing the idea that Ahn is a caring business leader.

“Ahn allowed Internet users to download his anti-virus vaccine for free in the early 1990s because there was no demand for the program. At that time, the Internet was not widely used in this country. Who would have needed or even known of such an anti-virus vaccine program if their computer remained safe from virus attacks?”

The vocal critic of Ahn alleged that the SNU professor overstated stock options that he gave to the AhnLab staff. “He distributed 80,000 shares to his staff, which accounts for merely 1.25 percent of the entire company stock. It is a really small tiny portion, given that Ahn had 1.46 million stocks in the company.”

Hwang also challenged the public perception that Ahn is a successful business leader. “AhnLab has branches in America and China. But its profits from them combined account for less than 5 percent of the company’s earnings,” he said. “Its technology or competitiveness is not world-class. The major customers of the AhnLab are governments, state-run firms, Internet portals and conglomerates,” he said.

Hwang’s remarks were taken to mean that Ahn’s strong network with the public sector made it possible for AhnLab to sign business contracts with the public sector.

He said there are many small- and medium-sized firms that are as successful as AhnLab in terms of technology, earnings and market share and that Ahn’s achievements were exaggerated.