Korea should double down on technological renovation
Sam Altman, co-founder of OpenAI, met President Yoon Suk Yeol and representatives of domestic startups, Friday. After visiting Europe in May, Altman also traveled to Japan, Israel and the United Arab Emirates to meet with government and parliamentary authorities there. In an unprecedented move, he met with startup entrepreneurs in Korea.
Altman, called the "father of ChatGPT," and also the CEO of the U.S.-based artificial intelligence (AI) technology company, said he would seek investment opportunities and expand cooperation with Korean firms.
"We are exploring investing more in Korean startups and are very excited to explore joint chip cooperation to develop AI accelerators," Altman told a group of some 130 startup leaders.
Attendees of the event, hosted by the Ministry of SMEs and Startups, showed keen interest in the direction, ethics and regulations of AI-related technology. Minister Lee Young pointed out that more than 200,000 AI-based startups are founded in Korea every year and sought more business opportunities between those companies and OpenAI.
Altman responded, "I think the next three years will probably be the greatest startup opportunity since the internet…" He also positively assessed possible collaborations with Korea's Big Tech companies such as Samsung Electronics, Hyundai Motor Group and LG Electronics. He also met with Korean AI developers and founders during another event organized by Softbank Ventures.
The potential collaboration between OpenAI and domestic startups is very meaningful in that it will help both expand business scope and items. As Altman put it, now is the opportune time for technological renovation. AI has become state-of-the-art and is poised to expand its ecosystem network at full throttle, reminiscent of the emergence of the internet and cellular phones, which ultimately overhauled the industrial landscape. It is heralding a "big bang" in the industrial paradigm with the possible advent of the 5th Industrial Revolution.
In order to survive increasingly tougher global competition, enterprises should tackle diverse challenges. The Yoon Suk Yeol government, for its part, should roll up its sleeves to help companies leap forward on the global stage by assisting with technological developments and deregulation.
Altman praised Korea for taking the lead in the global AI ecosystem. Yet Korea needs to tackle tectonic challenges to lead the global AI market. Most urgently, it should nurture human resources. For instance, the U.S. federal government poured some 1 trillion won ($773 million) to establish an AI graduate school at MIT. China has been pushing for a project to raise some 5 million AI experts in the next five years. In contrast, Korea is suffering from a lack of professors and facilities despite sprouting AI-related departments and aspirants.
For starters, Korea should realign its education curriculum and other systems in universities while strengthening cooperation between industries and academia, thus laying the ground for creating AI experts and prompting relevant research and development. The administration should take measures to boost the technology renovation. Businesses should also sharpen their global competitiveness by applying AI in all processes of manufacturing and marketing as well as R&D.
Altman reckons that semiconductors are the sector that Korea should designate as its first priority. He underscored the need for Korea to expand its capabilities in the production of system chips, the setup of an AI ecosystem through deregulation, and play a leading role in setting up an international standard.
Korea has been focusing on boosting semiconductors as its backbone industry. In March, the Yoon government announced a plan to construct the world's largest system chip cluster by investing 300 trillion won in the Seoul metropolitan area. The plan should be progressed without interruption. It is time for the government and the private sector to combine their efforts to enable Korea to play a leading role in the forthcoming AI era.
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