Nam Hyun-woo has worked as a staff writer at The Korea Times since 2013, mostly covering business and politics. He currently belongs to the Business Desk where he covers topics such as emerging tech, AI, ICT and Korea's chaebol community. Prior to joining the team, he was the paper's correspondent for the presidential office of Korea during the Yoon Suk Yeol and Moon Jae-in administrations.
LG Electronics to establish control tower for robotics business
LG Electronics' CLOiD home robots generate motion data at the company's Yangjae R&D Campus in Seoul in this handout photo released Tuesday. Courtesy of LG Electronics
By Nam Hyun-woo
Song Si-yong, head of LG Electronics' Robotics Business Center / Courtesy of LG Electronics
LG Electronics said Tuesday it will establish a robotics business center to consolidate its capabilities in robot commercialization, manufacturing and other parts of the robotics supply chain.
According to the company, the new organization will report directly to CEO Lyu Jae-cheol and be headed by Song Si-yong, who previously held senior leadership positions at the company's Production Engineering Research Institute.
LG Electronics carried out an organizational restructuring solely to establish the new organization, which will begin operations on Wednesday.
The company said the center will operate as “an end-to-end business organization” covering business development, sales and operations. It will also have a dedicated data factory organization, so that it can secure data factory capabilities promptly to collect high-quality operational data and advance LG’s robot foundation model.
As part of this strategy, LG Electronics said it is building a large-scale data factory at its Yangjae R&D Campus in Seoul, with operations set to begin this year.
LG Electronics said it expects the center will set up a more efficient and agile decision-making framework, so that it can create momentum for developing strategies and technologies for robotics.
It is also expected to bring together robotics capabilities of affiliates such as LG CNS and LG AI Research, accelerating its efforts to expand partnerships with global Big Tech companies.
LG Electronics said it will improve its presence in industrial, commercial and home robot markets. With the new center focusing on home robots, its subsidiaries Robostar and Bear Robotics will each concentrate on industrial and commercial robotics, respectively.
“LG Electronics will become a comprehensive robotics solution provider by combining its capabilities in finished robot products, core components such as actuators, data generation and LG Group’s ecosystem to support commercialization in real-world environments,” a company official said.