[SC25 Review] In the Era of AI Supercomputers, Korea Remains Trapped by GPUs

Experts: Need for Diverse Strategies to Secure Competitiveness in Servers, Cooling, and Talent

As the global supercomputing industry transitions into the era of artificial intelligence (AI)-based data centers, experts have pointed out that South Korea must secure operational capabilities for the entire system-including servers, storage, networks, cooling, and operating software-separately from simply acquiring graphics processing units (GPUs). There is a warning against complacency following the Ministry of Science and ICT's agreement with Nvidia to supply 260,000 GPUs.

[SC25 Review] In the Era of AI Supercomputers, Korea Remains Trapped by GPUs

Shin Jungkyu, CEO of Labelup, is being interviewed by The Asia Business Daily in front of the booth at the SC25 exhibition hall. Photo by Paek Jongmin, Tech Specialist

Shin Jungkyu, CEO of Labelup, who attended the 'SC25' event held in St. Louis, United States, explained, "There are increasing cases where AI replaces conventional supercomputing calculations with only 1/100 to 1/1000 of the computational load. This shift is fundamentally shaking the structure of supercomputing." He noted that, while the precision may be lower, the adoption of methods that achieve high computational speed and then correct accuracy through multiple iterations is becoming widespread. As a result, supercomputers worldwide are naturally being reorganized into AI-centric clusters.

Professor Youngjae Kim from the Department of Computer Science at Sogang University is touring the SC25 exhibition hall. Photo by Professor Youngjae Kim

Already, most newly built supercomputers worldwide are adopting GPU-based architectures under the name "AI supercomputers." More than 75% of the supercomputers listed in the TOP500 rankings are Nvidia GPU-based systems. The sixth national supercomputer, which the Korea Institute of Science and Technology Information (KISTI) is currently introducing, is also based on Nvidia systems. While the massive data centers of big tech companies are not included in these rankings, the line between them and supercomputers is becoming increasingly blurred.

Nvidia showcased a demo connecting with a supercomputer via NVQLink at the SC25 event. Photo by Paek Jongmin, Tech Specialist

In this context, there is a growing trend toward redesigning entire data centers-including cooling, power supply, and cabling-to address the massive power consumption of supercomputers. The rapid rise of many cooling-related companies at SC25 is a testament to this trend. System companies such as HP, Dell, and Supermicro showcased a wide range of systems with integrated cooling technologies.

Nvidia, the industry leader, went even further by actively promoting technology that connects supercomputers and quantum computers, demonstrating its continued investment in the future.

American server company Dell exhibited a system combined with a large-scale cooling device at the SC25 exhibition hall. Photo by Paek Jongmin, Tech Specialist

The problem is that South Korea is not adequately prepared to respond to these changes. Kim Youngjae, professor at the Department of Computer Science at Sogang University, expressed concern, saying, "This year at SC25, the presence of server companies was particularly notable. South Korea's overall industrial structure is weak." He warned that the country's industrial structure is vulnerable in various fields, including servers, storage, networks, cooling, and software.

Although Korean companies participated in this event mainly focusing on memory semiconductors, they were unable to overcome the limitations of being few in number and limited in scope. In contrast, Taiwanese companies are rapidly growing, with TSMC at the center of semiconductor production and companies manufacturing supercomputers and servers based on these chips. At SC25, Taiwanese companies such as Gigabyte and Pegasus attracted attention by exhibiting their own Nvidia servers.

Professor Kim explained, "It is difficult to secure real operational competitiveness because there is a lack of an ecosystem encompassing the entire stack, including software, storage, and networks." MangoBoost CEO Kim Jangwoo also remarked, "If there is insufficient understanding of systems, it is difficult to create a comprehensive ecosystem." CEO Shin further pointed out, "What South Korea is missing is not the number of GPUs, but the operational capabilities of data centers."