Lee Gyu-lee is a business writer at The Korea Times, focusing primarily on IT & telecommunications, the Ministry of Trade, Industry and Energy and KOTRA. Prior to this, she has covered a wide range of cultural news, from film, television and K-pop to lifestyle and fashion.
LG chairman taps Silicon Valley partners to fast-track AI, robotics strategy
LG Group Chairman Koo Kwang-mo, left, shakes hand with Palantir Technologies CEO Alex Karp in Silicon Valley, Calif., Thursday. Courtesy of LG Group
By Lee Gyu-lee
Chairman meets Palantir, Skild AI CEOs
LG Group Chairman Koo Kwang-mo is ramping up the conglomerate’s push into artificial intelligence (AI), using a high-profile Silicon Valley tour to secure strategic partners, refine its commercialization strategy and accelerate execution.
Koo met with Palantir Technologies CEO Alex Karp and Skild AI co-founders Deepak Pathak and Abhinav Gupta on Thursday (local time).
The meetings underscore LG’s drive to tighten its AI road map and execution priorities as it races to establish leadership in AI transformation (AX) and physical AI.
Koo met with Karp and Palantir executives to discuss the company’s Ontology platform — a software system that integrates data for real-time simulation — as well as its AI-driven decision-making systems and real-world use cases.
Palantir has built a strong track record across manufacturing, finance and logistics by leveraging its data integration and AI-powered decision-making technologies.
The discussion explored potential collaboration opportunities and benchmarking elements that could enhance LG’s own implementation of AI across its industrial network.
Koo also reviewed manufacturing use cases, where Palantir’s AI systems have optimized production processes and operational efficiency, focusing on how to translate those capabilities into factory and supply‑chain improvements across LG affiliates.
LG Group Chairman Koo Kwang-mo, right, speaks to Skild AI co-founder Abhinav Gupta, left, as he observes Skild AI's humanoid technology demonstration at its office in California, Thursday. Courtesy of LG Group
The chairman also visited Skild AI’s Silicon Valley office to observe a humanoid robot demonstration powered by the company’s robotic foundation models (RFM).
Founded by two Carnegie Mellon University professors, Skild AI has become a prominent name in physical AI, drawing strategic investments from global tech players such as SoftBank and Nvidia.
LG has already deployed autonomous mobile robots (AMRs) across hospitality logistics operations, such as serving and delivery, and is now moving into home robotics with humanoid platforms.
Last year, LG CNS signed the first strategic partnership with Skild AI in Korea and made an equity investment with plans to develop industrial AI humanoid robot solutions based on Skild AI’s RFMs.
These solutions, fine-tuned with data from manufacturing and logistics sites, will help robots perform a wider range of tasks that have so far been difficult for conventional machines.
LG CNS aims to combine Skild AI’s models with its own robotics technologies to accelerate robot deployments across sectors. Meanwhile, LG Innotek is exploring collaboration with Skild AI on parts supply.
During his visit, Koo also met with CEO Kim Dong-su and other executives at LG Technology Ventures, the group’s corporate venture capital arm. He assessed changes in the U.S. investment landscape and discussed portfolio strategies to bolster LG’s long‑term business competitiveness.
The chairman emphasized the need for proactive investment amid the AI paradigm shift, urging the unit to serve as a forward base for building a key pillar of LG’s future portfolio.
LG Technology Ventures manages an $890 million fund backed by seven LG affiliates and has invested roughly $420 million across about 90 startups and funds globally, including in Silicon Valley, Canada and Israel.