[THE INVESTOR] The combined sales of Internet of Things companies in Korea rose 23.4 percent in 2017 from a year earlier, a survey showed on Feb. 12.

Domestic sales and exports of IoT companies came to 7.16 trillion won (US$6.60 billion) in 2017, compared with 5.8 trillion won in 2016.

The survey of local IoT firms revealed that domestic sales jumped 22.7 percent on-year to 6.65 trillion won while exports rose 34.6 percent to 510 billion won.

The latest findings also said the number of people hired by IoT companies stood at 479,734 last year.

The survey was based on 528 firms, according to the Ministry of Science and ICT.

By Seong Seung-hyun and newswires (ssh@heraldcorp.com)