Frefins Joins KODIT’s ‘First Penguin’ to Revolutionize the Rental Market with ERP Solutions
Reading Time: 2 minutesFrefins, a South Korean cloud platform company specializing in the rental industry, has been selected to participate in the Korea Credit Guarantee Fund (KODIT)‘s prestigious startup guarantee program, “First Penguin“. Over the next three years, Frefins will receive a comprehensive package of financial support and credit guarantees totaling 1.5 billion KRW.
The First Penguin program by KODIT aims to support and foster startups that dare to take on the risks of uncharted territories, much like a pioneering penguin that dives into treacherous waters to encourage others to follow. The program selects startups that demonstrate the willingness to embrace uncertainty with innovative ideas and robust technological capabilities.
Following the sale of his AI-driven parking management company, Parking Cloud—known for its “iParking” system—to NHN and SK E&S, founder Shin Sang-yong, alongside former Hyundai Card and Hyundai Capital executive Kim Byung-seok, established Frefins. Leveraging their experiences from Parking Cloud, they have committed to enhancing the growth of small to mid-sized rental businesses by offering a standardized ERP (Enterprise Resource Planning) system for rental operations, financial support, and specialized consulting services such as ‘Rental Transformation (RX)’, aimed at aiding manufacturers and sellers overwhelmed by unsold inventory.
Frefins has introduced a specialized ERP solution designed uniquely for rental businesses, allowing smaller operators to subscribe at affordable rates without the initial financial burden typically associated with system development. Many local rental companies, which have traditionally managed rental and inventory assets manually through a handful of dedicated employees, now demonstrate a strong demand for an ERP system tailored to their needs.
With Frefins’ ERP, businesses can efficiently track and manage their rental and inventory statuses, enabling strategic management and easy assessment of business performance. The system includes features such as electronic contracting, tax invoice processing, and facilitates cost reduction through cooperative purchasing and the exchange of idle assets, thus allowing rental operators to offer more competitively priced services.
In the rental industry, where pre-purchasing goods for customer leasing is standard, effective management of operational funds is essential. The traditional reliance on manual asset management by many small and medium-sized rental companies has often prevented them from receiving accurate corporate valuations and credit assessments from financial institutions.
Furthermore, Frefins is enhancing its fintech operations, utilizing big data from rental assets to help companies seamlessly obtain operational funding through financial institutions, based on the trustworthy data managed within their ERP.
Jo Jun-ki, the Incheon Startup Branch Manager at the KODIT, noted that Frefins is making significant strides in the relatively untapped market of rental industry cloud platforms and is fostering a symbiotic growth with smaller rental companies, aligning perfectly with the First Penguin program’s mission to promote a healthy startup ecosystem and mutual growth.
Kim Byung-seok, CEO of Frefins, expressed his gratitude to KODIT for providing the opportunity to make significant advances in the rental market, which is expected to expand to 100 trillion won by 2025. He stated, “We aim to be a company that not only supports rental operators, but also offers ‘Rental Transformation (RX)’ consulting to manufacturers and sellers who are struggling with excess inventory in their warehouses due to poor sales. This will help open new sales channels and increase revenue for these small enterprises.”
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