Five Companies Selected as 'National AI Representatives': Naver, SK Telecom, LG, NC, and Upstage

High Scores for In-House Model Development and Open Source Policies
Support Provided for GPUs, Data, and Talent... One Team to Be Eliminated Every Six Months

Five companies have been selected as recipients of support under the "Independent AI Foundation Model Project," an initiative to foster leading artificial intelligence (AI) development teams in Korea. The selected companies are Naver Cloud, Upstage, SK Telecom, NC AI, and LG AI Research Institute.

The Ministry of Science and ICT announced on August 4 that it had chosen these five elite teams after conducting both document reviews and presentation evaluations of the companies and institutions participating in the Independent AI Foundation Model Project.

In addition to the five selected companies, Kakao, KT, Motif Technologies, Konan Technology, and KAIST also formed elite teams and competed for selection but were unsuccessful.

The evaluation criteria for this round included: ▲ technical capability and development experience, ▲ excellence of development objectives, ▲ superiority of development strategies and technologies, and ▲ expected impact and contribution plans. The five teams that have been shortlisted as support recipients will be finalized after further procedures such as project budget review and adjustment. Following the selection of these five teams, the Ministry plans to gradually reduce the number of government-supported AI models through stage evaluations every six months.

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High Marks for In-House Model Development and Open Source... Support for GPUs, Data, and Talent

The Ministry of Science and ICT assessed that all five selected teams have proven their advanced capabilities in AI model development. Starting "from scratch," these teams aim to develop AI foundation models that embody the essence of sovereign AI.

The fact that the teams proposed open-source policies allowing their AI models to be used commercially by other companies was also highly evaluated. This is expected to expand the domestic AI ecosystem, foster the development of diverse AI services, and enhance public access to AI. Challenging goals based on scalability, such as advancing beyond existing language models to multimodal or omni models capable of processing various types of data, also received positive feedback.

The government will support the five selected teams with data, talent, and graphics processing units (GPUs).

First, all five elite teams applied for data support. Data support for these teams consists of ▲ joint data procurement, ▲ broadcast video data, and ▲ team-specific dataset construction and processing. The Ministry, in consultation with the elite teams, will jointly purchase (10 billion KRW) and process the finalized data for provision starting in September. Additionally, each team will receive an extra 2.8 billion KRW to build and process datasets tailored to their individual AI model development strategies, and high-quality broadcast video data for training (20 billion KRW) will also be provided.

In terms of talent, Upstage among the five elite teams requested support in this area. Accordingly, the government will cover necessary costs such as salaries and research expenses for outstanding overseas research teams recruited by Upstage. The remaining budget for the AI overseas talent recruitment project will be allocated through a separate call to support domestic companies in attracting overseas talent to lead AI projects.

For GPUs, Upstage, NC AI, and LG AI Research Institute among the selected teams will receive support. The Ministry plans to provide GPUs that match the business plans proposed by these elite teams. Specifically, this year’s support will include either 512 units of Nvidia B200 or 1,024 units of H100. SK Telecom and Naver Cloud are excluded from GPU support this year, as they have been selected as suppliers to lease GPUs for this project. Therefore, the elite teams including these companies will not receive GPU support this year, but will become eligible from the second half of next year.

The government will finalize the project scope and support details for the five elite teams by reflecting the evaluation feedback from this round and through further budget review and adjustment. Feedback will also be provided to the other participating teams.

The Ministry of Science and ICT plans to conduct the first stage evaluation at the end of December, based on the AI foundation models developed and secured by the five teams by the end of this year. In each stage evaluation, which will take place every six months, one team will be eliminated. The first stage evaluation scheduled for December will aim for a multidimensional assessment, with the evaluation method to be finalized through consultation with the elite teams. A nationwide and expert contest will also be held during this process, with detailed schedules and methods to be announced later.

The Ministry plans to hold a kickoff ceremony for the five elite teams soon. At the time of the ceremony, the selected teams will be designated as "K-AI Model" and "K-AI Company." In addition, the Ministry will support the expansion of the AI ecosystem, enhancement of public AI accessibility, AI transformation (AX), and utilization in national defense and security, based on the AI foundation models developed and secured by each elite team.

Minister Park Yun-kyu of the Ministry of Science and ICT stated, "I applaud not only the capabilities of the five selected elite teams but also the passion of all participating teams," adding, "This bold challenge marks only the beginning and the starting point for 'AI for everyone.' The government will actively support the advancement of Korean AI companies and institutions and the expansion of the sovereign AI ecosystem."