Tae-kyung Yoo, the President and Chief Executive Officer of Lumens Co., Ltd. (Lumens) was presented with the first Alumni Award of the Year from the College of Information Science & Technology (CIST). The Award is given to alumni who have achieved significant academic feats or contributed to the development of industry. President Yoo was recognized with building the foundations of the Light Emitting Diode (LED) industry, and developing it into one of the mainstream industries in Korea. The ceremony was held at Fusion Hall, KAIST Institute Building (E4) on September 19, and was attended by KAIST President Sung Mo Kang as well as professors and students. 

President Yoo received his master's degree and Ph. D. in Electrical Engineering in 1985 and 1989, respectively. He went to Cornell University for his post-doctoral research and worked at the LG Electronics Advanced Research Institute. He received numerous awards for contributing to the industry, and went on to start his own venture company, which led to Lumens. Currently, Lumens has 6 subsidiary companies and 8 sites globally, with over 2100 employees worldwide. In 2013, the sales revenue was $572 million, and it was one of the top 10 LED companies in 2012, worldwide. 

After receiving the award, President Yoo gave a seminar, titled "LED Past and Future: an Important Role on Changing the Korean Industrial World." He started the seminar by saying that light is closely related to living organisms, and it is used in many industries such as the bio & medical, display, automotive, and lighting industry. He talked about the history of the growth of the LED industry and how it changed the electronics industry.

He went on to talk about the future of LEDs, showing examples of how they could be applied to agriculture, the maritime industry, bio & medical devices, and other fields we do not yet know. He concluded his seminar by saying LEDs have a lot of potential and advised the students to have more interest in LEDs.