Hyundai Heavy Industries' shipyard in Ulsan /Courtesy of Hyundai Heavy Industries

Hyundai Heavy Industries, one of the world's three largest shipbuilders, will implement the firm's first ever voluntary retirement program for managers over 50.

Those who agree to the program will be given up to 60 months' salary depending how much time they have left untill they reach retirement age. The company will also give them a lump sum to support tuition for children and medical expenses calculated on the assumption that they would have worked until retirement age.

Fears of drastic restructuring are spreading across the industry since the program resembles those of the Asian financial crisis in the late 1990s.

Earlier, Renault Samsung laid off 14 percent of its 5,500 staff, and online game maker NCsoft let over 400 workers go. A number of troubled construction firms also carried out restructuring on a massive scale.

GM Korea shed 130 staff through voluntary retirement, as did GS Caltech and Korean Air, which let 70 and 50 employees go.