KAIST revealed that it has been selected as the host site for the Times Higher Education (THE) Innovation & Impact Summit 2019. President Sung-Chul Shin met with Phil Baty, the Editorial Director for Global Rankings, and other THE officials at the THE Asia Universities Summit 2018 and finalized the plans to hold the summit on the Daejeon campus. Around 500 university presidents, government and academic authorities, and experts will gather for three days starting from April 2, 2019 to discuss the role of innovation during and the ripple effects of the Fourth Industrial Revolution.

THE held the first Innovation & Impact Summit last year at The Hong Kong Polytechnic University. As a novel event, the summit emphasizes the importance of the interaction between university academia and the outside world. THE intends to reveal for the first time its newest ranking based on, as the name suggests, innovative initiative and societal influence of the institutions. The metric will measure the universities’ impact on society and how they engage with businesses and communities by collecting data on research income and turnover from active spin-off activities. Baty stated, “Governments have been investing to develop world-class universities to drive economic growth, with a strong focus on the applications of new knowledge and the commercialization of ideas.”

President Shin remarked, “KAIST is the cradle of the entrepreneurial mindset, making it the most suitable place [for the summit]. The fact that a great number of presidents from world-class universities and establishments recognized KAIST as an exceptional institution aided in securing the honor of hosting.”