Lotte Chairman Shin Dong-bin donates million for PyeongChang Olympics

“What Skiing and company management have in common is that they both require high concentration.”

Lotte Group Chairman Shin Dong-bin (61), who identifies company management with skiing, has decided to give a huge donation for the 2018 PyeongChang Olympics. Therefore, Lotte has officially become a sponsor of the Olympic Organizing Committee by promising 60 billion won (50.27 million U.S. dollars) to the committee in the Lakai Sandpine Resort in Gangneung, Gangwon Province on Wednesday.

Shin, who is serving as the chairman of the Korea Ski Association, learned how to ski from his childhood and was a skiing player when he was a student at Aoyama Gakuin University.

Shin is still good at skiing. At the Alpensia Ski Resort in Pyeongchang on Feb. 7, he skied down the advanced slope side-by-side with Sarah Lewis, the secretary general of the International Ski Federation. Lewis, who participated in the 1988 Calgary Olympics, called Shin “an excellent skier.”

Since becoming the chairman of the association in 2014, Shin's foremost goal is Korea's winning the first gold medal in winter sports. In order to achieve that goal, he scouted Kim Magnus (18), the first gold medalist in a Cross-country free skiing in the 2016 Winter Youth Olympics held in Lillehammer, Norway in February.

Shin often gives detailed advice to players according to his knowledge in skiing. “Kasai Noriaki is 44 years old, but he still has good results. Korean players in their 30s should maintain their stamina and skills through training," Shin told ski athletes when he visited Jeongseon in early this year. “Good performance comes not only from athletes’ techniques, but also from good quality of their equipment,” while ordering to hire a coach who is specializing in waxing that helps with slipperiness of ski equipment.

“The chairman is equally active in his role in the Korea Ski Association to his role in the group. He receives reports from the association every month and manages its business by himself,” a Lotte Group official said.

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