By Kang Shin-who
Staff Reporter
Pohang University of Science and Technology (POSTECH) is now one of the richest universities in the country, riding on the bullish stock market.
The price of POSCO stocks held by the school soared more than six times to 700,000 won per share Thursday from 110,000 won seven years ago.
POSTECH currently has about 2 million stocks of its founder, POSCO, and became the richest university in Korea with the stocks worth over 1,400 billion won. If other stocks held by POSCTECH are added, the school’s fund would surpass 2 trillion won. POSCO has contributed 300 billion won, including a huge amount of stocks, to POSTECH as the nation’s top steel maker transferred management to the school itself.
Relative to its counterpart, Korea Advanced Institute of Science and Technology (KAIST), which is aiming to raise 2 trillion won within four years, POSTECH is on course to being Korea's leading science and technology university.
The school plans to sell some of its stocks in order to employ world standard scholars and build state-of-the-art research facilities.
Earlier in an interview with The Korea Times, Baik Sung-gi, president of the school, stressed the importance of development funds and suggested that Korean universities diversify their income sources without depending on tuition fees alone.
Established in Pohang City, North Gyeongsang Province in 1986, it has about 3,000 students, 800 researchers and 230 faculty members studying and researching at the large 165 hectare campus with advanced facilities located in the southern east coast of Korea.