SIHEUNG, South Korea -- Growing stockpiles of used engineering equipment for sale in a gritty industrial area south of Seoul provide a rusting epitaph: Here lie the remains of small manufacturing businesses, once South Korea's economic backbone, but now gone bust.
Used machinery, right, from manufacturers who went bust shows the challenge President Lee Jae Myung faces in trying to use AI to revive a sector that was once the backbone of South Korea's economy. A 15% tariff on exports to the U.S. adds to the headache. (Nikkei montage/Source photos by Steven Borowiec and Reuters)
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