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Why Is Innovation in the Care Business So Difficult in Korea?[Part 3] Korea’s Care Demand Market: Why Is the Private-Pay Market So Small Despite Growing Care Needs?

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This is the third of four articles in the series “Why Is Innovation in the Care Business So Difficult in Korea?” Korea’s care market is growing rapidly. But as the market expands, are new care businesses becoming equally diverse? This four-part series explores that question. Part 1 examines the supply structure of Korea’s care market; Part 2 explores business model innovation among care companies in Korea and abroad; Part 3 examines the characteristics of demand in Korea’s care market; and Part 4 examines innovation strategies care entrepreneurs can use to create opportunities in a small market. Part 1 showed that Korea’s care market is concentrated in an institutionally regulated quasi-market, where companies have limited discretion to design new prices and services. Part 2 examined how care companies in Korea and abroad have innovated their business models within different market structures. But can the difficulty of building a care business in Korea be explained by supply st...
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Why Is Innovation in the Care Business So Difficult in Korea? [Part 2] How Do Care Companies Innovate Their Business Models? Lessons from Korea and Abroad

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This is the second of four articles in the series “Why Is Innovation in the Care Business So Difficult in Korea?” Korea’s care market is growing rapidly. But as the market expands, are new care businesses becoming equally diverse? This four-part series explores that question. Part 1 examines the supply structure of Korea’s care market; Part 2 explores business model innovation among care companies in Korea and abroad; Part 3 examines the characteristics of demand in Korea’s care market; and Part 4 considers how entrepreneurs can start small and enter the market. Part 1 compared the different ways care markets operate in the United States, United Kingdom, Netherlands, Japan, and Korea, and characterized Korea as an “institutionally regulated quasi-market.” How, then, do actual care companies innovate their business models within these different market structures? Rather than recounting the success stories of well-known care companies, this article asks which customers, instit...
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Why Is Innovation in the Care Business So Difficult in Korea? [Part 1] Korea’s Care Market: Korea’s Care Market: Why Are New Care Businesses So Rare Despite So Many Providers??

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  [Author’s Note] This is the first of four articles in the series “ Korea’s Care Market: Why Are New Care Businesses So Rare Despite So Many Providers ?” Korea’s care market is growing rapidly. But as the market expands, are new care businesses becoming equally diverse? This four-part series explores that question. Part 1 examines the supply structure of Korea’s care market; Part 2 explores business model innovation among care companies in Korea and abroad; Part 3 examines the characteristics of demand in Korea’s care market; and Part 4 considers how entrepreneurs can start small and enter the market. 1. More Providers, but Little Innovation Korea’s elder care market has grown rapidly. Total long-term care benefit expenditures rose from approximately KRW 11.1146 trillion in 2021 to KRW 17.684 trillion in 2025—an increase of approximately 59 percent over four years.[1] The care delivery network expanded alongside it. As of the end of June 2026, Korea had 30,054 long-ter...
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