Samsung Asset Management has been named the preferred bidder for the project to select the dedicated management institution for the Small and Medium Enterprise Retirement Pension Fund (SME pension fund) being pursued by the Korea Workers' Compensation and Welfare Service.
Samsung Asset Management said Friday it had been selected as the preferred bidder in the evaluation to choose the dedicated management institution for the SME pension fund. In this evaluation, five of the seven qualitative evaluation panelists, composed of external experts, gave Samsung Asset Management high marks.
The SME pension fund is a public fund-type retirement pension program in which contributions paid by SME employers are pooled into a joint fund by the Korea Workers' Compensation and Welfare Service and managed in an integrated manner by a dedicated management institution. Because a professional management institution manages assets collectively to secure economies of scale, the program cites stable returns and low fees as its strengths. It is particularly valued as a program that provides workers at small workplaces with 30 or fewer employees, which lack management capacity, with asset management opportunities on par with those of large corporations.
Samsung Asset Management has served as the first dedicated management institution for the SME pension fund since the program's introduction in 2022, performing asset management, risk management, marketing, and policy support. If it is finally selected after negotiations with the Korea Workers' Compensation and Welfare Service, it will manage the fund from September 1 this year through the end of August 2030.
The SME pension fund is set to expand its eligible enrollment. It is currently operated for workplaces with 30 or fewer employees, but enrollment will be expanded in stages to workplaces with fewer than 50 and fewer than 100 employees. Starting next month, an Individual Retirement Pension (IRP) will also be introduced, broadening the enrollment base to include special-type workers, platform workers, and the self-employed.
"The SME retirement pension fund is a public program that protects the retirement of SME workers who have been in the blind spot of the retirement pension system," Samsung Asset Management CEO Kim Woo-seok said. "As we continue our role as the dedicated management institution, we will concentrate our company's capabilities and stay with the program to the end so that it can grow further."
