INCHEON — The Incheon Free Economic Zone is repositioning itself from a platform for attracting foreign capital into an advanced-technology base aimed at capturing a share of a global supply chain worth more than 100 trillion won that is being reshaped by U.S. technology restrictions on China. The plan rests on two pillars: drawing 1 trillion won in next-generation artificial intelligence mobility research and development, and shifting the biotechnology sector toward AI.
The Incheon Free Economic Zone Authority announced the development plan at the 2026 IFEZ Future Strategy Forum, held on the 13th at Gyeongwonjae by Walkerhill in Songdo to mark the authority's 23rd anniversary. The forum focused on sector-by-sector roadmaps for moving into market gaps created by U.S. measures against China.
Future mobility drew the most attention. U.S. restrictions on imports of connected-car parts and software from China and Russia are expected to create replacement demand of about 109 trillion won in the global market by 2034, including 33.6 trillion won in the United States. In response, the Korea Automotive Technology Institute proposed linking Incheon to a seven-year national R&D program, the AI Connected Car Technology Development Innovation Project, which runs from 2028 to 2034 with total funding of 990 billion won, including 698.4 billion won from the central government. The plan would make Cheongna the main testing and certification hub and build a hyper-connected industrial testbed belt linking Yeongjong, home to the airport, with Songdo and the Port of Incheon, generating an estimated 2.079 trillion won in production.
In biotechnology, the authority is treating as an opportunity the passage of the U.S. BIOSECURE Act, which has put five companies of concern, including China's WuXi Biologics, at risk of being shut out. Han Gyun-hee, head of K-NIBRT at Yonsei University, called for introducing a biopharma AI transformation framework that merges AI and digital twins into production processes, rather than limiting operations to drug manufacturing, in order to help Songdo's biotech firms pass 10 trillion won in combined annual revenue sooner.
Plans for AI transformation in manufacturing were also detailed. Bae Young-im, a senior research fellow at the Gyeonggi Research Institute, proposed building a manufacturing data space based on the international Asset Administration Shell standard, modeled on Germany's Manufacturing-X industrial data initiative, to connect IFEZ with surrounding manufacturers such as those in the Namdong National Industrial Complex.
The strategies presented form an implementation roadmap for the ABC+E ecosystem — artificial intelligence, biotechnology, cultural content and energy — the core industrial vision of the Incheon city government in its ninth local government term. The Incheon Free Economic Zone Authority said it would incorporate the experts' recommendations in full into the second IFEZ development plan now being drafted by the Incheon Institute.
"The main stage where the ABC+E convergence ecosystem declared in the ninth term will be realized is IFEZ," Incheon Mayor Park Chan-dae said. "We will actively reflect the strategies presented here in city policy so that the free economic zone can emerge as a center of the global value chain."
"This is the moment to completely overhaul our makeup, moving beyond a platform for attracting foreign capital to an innovation hub where advanced technology and industry converge," said Kim Jong-chul, commissioner of the Incheon Free Economic Zone Authority. "We will firmly establish our standing as a global special economic zone."