7 ms·

More on TMaxSoft. This software firm builds many 'hard' softwares like OS, DBMS or even MapReduce data processing cluster(like hadoop and spark). One might nat

More on TMaxSoft. This software firm builds many 'hard' softwares like OS, DBMS or even MapReduce data processing cluster(like hadoop and spark). One might naturally ask 'why build a wheel while there are plenty already built by open source developers?' and economically aware person might also ask 'how are selling their products while competing against ubuntu, postgresql, spark?' Cloning something from scratch and learning advanced technology in its process is a familiar thing in Korea. Enforcing home grown products to average customers, subsidizing one specific firm to take all domestic market share is how Samsung and Hyundai made its way to top global firms. So I guess the mental background for replacing OS by home made OS is similar to that which successfully grew Samsung. They are willing to pay off a lot of money so that a Korean firm outgrows Google, Facebook or Apple. An average developer knows it is a stupid plan to replicate linux or mysql from scratch. But government officials' heart still remain in the golden age when the very strategy they are executing with was valid for Samsung or Hyundai. The way this firm hires its employees is tighly coupled with government. In our country all men are obliged to military service. However there are couple of options: 1. B.S holders: no exemption. 2 years in a random role. 2. M.S holders: you get to work for private firm for 3 years. Called 'special research agents'. Mostly work for engineering related firms. 3. Ph.D holders: you are exempted as soon as you become a Ph.D holder. All these exemption rules according to the level of scholastic degree is to foster R&D capability of our nation. And here comes a perky question: 'What happens to Ph.D dropouts?' As some might have guessed: 'You go to TmaxSoft, get hefty salary, get a girl, get married.' I wouldn't say much about it if there weren't a fact that really bugs me. They do hoard M.S holders from best colleges, however the graduate students they hire aren't limited to CS majors. I've seen multiple chemistry majors or industrial engineering majors who dropped out of Ph.D course doing software engineering there. I have no idea how they could 'train' a non CS major to write code for hard core stuffs like OS or DBMS. And they tell the government officials that they have the best pool of engineers from prestigious colleges, which would ease the government to making decision to subsidize this firm.

6510 7y ago
> I have no idea how they could 'train' a non CS major to write code for hard core stuffs like OS or DBMS. There is probably someone better fit to describe this [hah!] but schools aren't really designed to teach something specific. It is more about creating hard working drones. Doing anything meaningful in [say] chemistry is harder than brainfuck.
theredbox 7y ago
Well not even Samsung can do proper SW engineering (it's an insanely failed side of Samsung and yeah it's that bad) and they can pay top dollar. Koreans just cant really do b2c products that well that are not hardware.
- Hydraulix989 7y ago
  Korea doesn’t value software engineers like Silicon Valley does. Over there, it is considered menial work and the pay is VERY substandard. This has been true as recently as 2018, but it is (too slowly) starting to change. The only FAANG with an engineering office in Seoul is Google.
  - ethbro 7y ago
    Is there any reason why global corporations aren't opening engineering offices there? Seems obvious knowledge-salary arbitrage.
    - Hydraulix989 7y ago
      Language barriers, timezones (their night is our day; it is flipped). Most skilled Korean software engineers end up in the Valley. Remote development only goes so far.
      - eatonphil 7y ago
        I don't see it any differently than companies with an office in India. While English is not a national language in RoK, Koreans are still taught English early. In my limited experience, being married to a Korean and having worked with Indians, Korean professionals speak English about as well as Indian professionals. The timezone is similar: India is 10 hours forward from America/New_York, RoK is 12 hours forward. Flights to RoK (12-14 hours) are actually significantly shorter than flights to India (20 hours). Indians are probably paid less than Koreans, but I don't know. And I cannot speak to the technical proficiencies of either. I'd definitely like to open an office in RoK some time. If anyone on here has done so or is interested, send me an email.
wuunderbar 7y ago
This is so interesting and new to me. Do you have links where I can read further about all this?
Jedd 7y ago
> Enforcing home grown products to average customers, subsidizing one specific firm to take all domestic market share is how Samsung and Hyundai made its way to top global firms. I can see how this would ensure domestic success, but how does that translate to 'top global firm' status unless the products / features & pricing are significantly superior?
- yorwba 7y ago
  It's hard to get to the point where your products are significantly superior if you have no revenue while you experiment with improvements to your product until it can compete on its own. Funding doesn't guarantee success, but without it you may have no chance at all.
- hkmurakami 7y ago
  It basically gives domestic firms breathing room to survive and grow, versus being suffocated by the currently superior products or foreign firms. The hope then is that in the future, with a stronger financial footing, these firms' products will improve to be truly competitive with those of the global competitors. At least in hardware/manufacturing, both South Korea and China have done this with great success thus far.
  - honestoHeminway 7y ago
    Europe, all in market-liberal spirits, has not done this. And it shows.
  - Jedd 7y ago
    > It basically gives domestic firms breathing room to survive and grow, versus being suffocated by the currently superior products or foreign firms. Yes, I get that. It's basic tariff protectionism. Many countries have done, and continue to, do this. Here in Australia we've done it for decades, but with no global success. > The hope then is that in the future ... I hope that isn't the official strategy. ; | The stronger financial footing (also achievable via vanilla domestic success sans tarrifs) doesn't necessarily guarantee global success, especially if other nation states are adopting similar fiscal & trade policies ... which it's fair to say they are.
deleted 7y ago
[deleted]
xbmcuser 7y ago
This is not something unique to Korea most governments do this. Subsidise or promote a homegrown product so that the homegrown product becomes competitive in the future. NASA supporting private rocket firms is an example of this.
- qrbLPHiKpiux 7y ago
  In the United States it's called Google.
pcr910303 7y ago
Er... I personally feel that this comment is too harsh to TmaxSoft and the government officials. Yeah, TmaxSoft builds and sells compatible DBMS/parallel computing solutions to the government — but I feel that it’s entirely understandable to use domestic software for things like that. The killer features there wasn’t that it was domestic — it was that it’s cheaper that the alternatives and it’s compatible with the big ones, ensuring no vendor lock-in. It’s definitely not a plan to make TmaxSoft some global company like Samsung or Hyundai; its not the 70s where the country has no big companies for the global market. The government has no incentives to do that, when Samsung’s software is used over the world. It’s just the preference of domestic software, and that TmaxSoft delivered actually usable software (not great, but is usable) to the government.
- totorovirus 7y ago
  You know how crucial software gains reliability through large user community. I don't want to fall into some random bs while using their 'usable' DB. condolence to programmers involved to government projects which will enforce them to use 'usable' piece of framework from domestic firm.
  - threatofrain 7y ago
    If at some point a nationally important company wishes to pivot or at least threaten to pivot on some important tech, their statements will carry less weight unless they've already been developing the tech with some visible gusto. I think there is some strategic value to holding something like Bing, assuming its costs are reasonable.
  - GoblinSlayer 7y ago
    Huh? You want there was only one product and nothing else? That's quite dystopian.
torgian 7y ago
This was interesting to read. I had no idea that Korea was trying to move to their own platform, nor did I know it’s been in the works for a decade. Crazy!
Mirioron 7y ago
>2. M.S holders: you get to work for private firm for 3 years. Called 'special research agents'. Mostly work for engineering related firms. So the government essentially uses people to subsidize businesses?
- totorovirus 7y ago
  by providing an alternative option for highly educated male engineers, yes.

6510 7y ago

> I have no idea how they could 'train' a non CS major to write code for hard core stuffs like OS or DBMS. There is probably someone better fit to describe this [hah!] but schools aren't really designed to teach something specific. It is more about creating hard working drones. Doing anything meaningful in [say] chemistry is harder than brainfuck.

theredbox 7y ago

Well not even Samsung can do proper SW engineering (it's an insanely failed side of Samsung and yeah it's that bad) and they can pay top dollar. Koreans just cant really do b2c products that well that are not hardware.

Hydraulix989 7y ago
Korea doesn’t value software engineers like Silicon Valley does. Over there, it is considered menial work and the pay is VERY substandard. This has been true as recently as 2018, but it is (too slowly) starting to change. The only FAANG with an engineering office in Seoul is Google.
- ethbro 7y ago
  Is there any reason why global corporations aren't opening engineering offices there? Seems obvious knowledge-salary arbitrage.
  - Hydraulix989 7y ago
    Language barriers, timezones (their night is our day; it is flipped). Most skilled Korean software engineers end up in the Valley. Remote development only goes so far.
    - eatonphil 7y ago
      I don't see it any differently than companies with an office in India. While English is not a national language in RoK, Koreans are still taught English early. In my limited experience, being married to a Korean and having worked with Indians, Korean professionals speak English about as well as Indian professionals. The timezone is similar: India is 10 hours forward from America/New_York, RoK is 12 hours forward. Flights to RoK (12-14 hours) are actually significantly shorter than flights to India (20 hours). Indians are probably paid less than Koreans, but I don't know. And I cannot speak to the technical proficiencies of either. I'd definitely like to open an office in RoK some time. If anyone on here has done so or is interested, send me an email.

wuunderbar 7y ago

This is so interesting and new to me. Do you have links where I can read further about all this?

Jedd 7y ago

> Enforcing home grown products to average customers, subsidizing one specific firm to take all domestic market share is how Samsung and Hyundai made its way to top global firms. I can see how this would ensure domestic success, but how does that translate to 'top global firm' status unless the products / features & pricing are significantly superior?

yorwba 7y ago
It's hard to get to the point where your products are significantly superior if you have no revenue while you experiment with improvements to your product until it can compete on its own. Funding doesn't guarantee success, but without it you may have no chance at all.
hkmurakami 7y ago
It basically gives domestic firms breathing room to survive and grow, versus being suffocated by the currently superior products or foreign firms. The hope then is that in the future, with a stronger financial footing, these firms' products will improve to be truly competitive with those of the global competitors. At least in hardware/manufacturing, both South Korea and China have done this with great success thus far.
- honestoHeminway 7y ago
  Europe, all in market-liberal spirits, has not done this. And it shows.
- Jedd 7y ago
  > It basically gives domestic firms breathing room to survive and grow, versus being suffocated by the currently superior products or foreign firms. Yes, I get that. It's basic tariff protectionism. Many countries have done, and continue to, do this. Here in Australia we've done it for decades, but with no global success. > The hope then is that in the future ... I hope that isn't the official strategy. ; | The stronger financial footing (also achievable via vanilla domestic success sans tarrifs) doesn't necessarily guarantee global success, especially if other nation states are adopting similar fiscal & trade policies ... which it's fair to say they are.

deleted 7y ago

[deleted]

xbmcuser 7y ago

This is not something unique to Korea most governments do this. Subsidise or promote a homegrown product so that the homegrown product becomes competitive in the future. NASA supporting private rocket firms is an example of this.

qrbLPHiKpiux 7y ago
In the United States it's called Google.

pcr910303 7y ago

Er... I personally feel that this comment is too harsh to TmaxSoft and the government officials. Yeah, TmaxSoft builds and sells compatible DBMS/parallel computing solutions to the government — but I feel that it’s entirely understandable to use domestic software for things like that. The killer features there wasn’t that it was domestic — it was that it’s cheaper that the alternatives and it’s compatible with the big ones, ensuring no vendor lock-in. It’s definitely not a plan to make TmaxSoft some global company like Samsung or Hyundai; its not the 70s where the country has no big companies for the global market. The government has no incentives to do that, when Samsung’s software is used over the world. It’s just the preference of domestic software, and that TmaxSoft delivered actually usable software (not great, but is usable) to the government.

totorovirus 7y ago
You know how crucial software gains reliability through large user community. I don't want to fall into some random bs while using their 'usable' DB. condolence to programmers involved to government projects which will enforce them to use 'usable' piece of framework from domestic firm.
- threatofrain 7y ago
  If at some point a nationally important company wishes to pivot or at least threaten to pivot on some important tech, their statements will carry less weight unless they've already been developing the tech with some visible gusto. I think there is some strategic value to holding something like Bing, assuming its costs are reasonable.
- GoblinSlayer 7y ago
  Huh? You want there was only one product and nothing else? That's quite dystopian.

torgian 7y ago

This was interesting to read. I had no idea that Korea was trying to move to their own platform, nor did I know it’s been in the works for a decade. Crazy!

Mirioron 7y ago

>2. M.S holders: you get to work for private firm for 3 years. Called 'special research agents'. Mostly work for engineering related firms. So the government essentially uses people to subsidize businesses?

totorovirus 7y ago
by providing an alternative option for highly educated male engineers, yes.