There is no such thing as reassurance on the global artificial intelligence (AI) battlefield. As the rankings change by the minute, the "AI alliance-building (Nvidia and OpenAI partnership)" and the "AI bubble debate (such as Meta's tens-of-billions-of-won talent incentives)" are unfolding simultaneously.
What is clear is that humanity has entered a major turning point from which there is no going back to the pre-AI era. Among the new administration's AI strategy and execution, the Lee Jae-myung administration launched the National AI Strategy Committee on Sept. 8 and began formulating concrete policies toward becoming a global "AI top three." Next year's AI-related budget will reach 10.1 trillion won, three times this year's. We organized and assessed the new administration's AI policy direction into five keywords.
1) One Team... accelerating government reorganization
What is promising in the Lee Jae-myung administration's AI policy is a change in "how work gets done." The National AI Strategy Committee, under the direct authority of the president, was launched as a body with real powers to formulate strategy and coordinate ministries' work, beyond a simple advisory role.
Im Moon-young, standing vice chair of the National AI Strategy Committee, said at the "AI G3 New Technology Strategy Breakfast Forum" held at the National Assembly Members' Office Building on Sept. 24, "A committee that takes photos with the president and offers advice once or twice a year will not do," adding, "This committee will first break down silos between ministries and deliver tangible results."
He added, "In an AI era where everything is connected, we have to aim at a 'moving target' because there is no set path." The National AI Strategy Committee has the authority to coordinate through committee resolutions when ministries are sharply divided on issues such as opening public data or security.
Following the "One Team" strategy, a council of government AI officers was also created under the National AI Strategy Committee. Ha Jung-woo, senior secretary for AI Future Planning, serves as chair of the council and as the nation's chief artificial intelligence officer (CAIO). Each ministry will designate a vice minister-level or director general-level official as its AI officer to support interministerial collaboration and whole-of-government policy execution through the council.
The government will also elevate the Minister of Science and ICT to deputy prime minister status through a government reorganization. The move is seen as intended to give more weight to AI and advanced technology policy at the pan-government level. The revival of the science and technology deputy prime minister is the first such change in about 17 years.
2) 200,000 GPUs... “independent AI foundation model”
The government plans to secure 200,000 GPUs within five years and accelerate efforts toward an independent AI foundation model. Minister Bae Kyung-hun of the Ministry of Science and ICT said, "OpenAI's ChatGPT is popular, but there must always be an alternative," adding, "We will build an independent AI foundation model and distribute it as open source so anyone around the world can use it."
The challenge is securing graphics processing units (GPUs). AI models based on the transformer architecture, which currently dominate the market, produce answers through enormous computation. The "scaling law" applies, whereby having more GPUs improves an AI model's performance.
Ryu Je-myung, second vice minister of the Ministry of Science and ICT, said, "GPUs are in absolute short supply to build an AI highway. We will secure 50,000 GPUs early and, through public-private cooperation, increase the number of GPUs in Korea to 200,000 by 2030."
Korea is estimated to have about 20,000 GPUs at present. U.S. companies Meta and xAI are said to have more than 350,000 and 200,000, respectively. The government expects GPU demand to further increase as reasoning services take off in earnest.
3) Physical AI... a showdown with China
Starting next year, national projects on physical AI, each worth 1 trillion won, will be carried out in North Jeolla and South Gyeongsang. As a result, competition with China for leadership in physical AI is inevitable. Physical AI refers to AI technologies combined with the physical world, such as manufacturing, robotics, and autonomous driving.
South Gyeongsang will develop AI models that can be deployed broadly in manufacturing fields such as precision control and predictive maintenance (advance detection of failures and anomalies). North Jeolla will research and demonstrate a collaborative intelligence platform to drive productivity gains and digital transformation in regional flagship manufacturing sectors, including commercial vehicles, agricultural machinery, and construction equipment.
Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of Economy and Finance Koo Yoon-cheol is holding an "AI Grand Transition Relay On-site Roundtable" to discuss plans for promoting AI factories.
4) AI basic society... “AI for all”
President Lee Jae-myung actively pushed a basic income policy when serving as Gyeonggi governor. In the AI era, he is focusing on structural changes such as job losses and widening income inequality and expanding this into a policy called an "AI basic society."
On Sept. 23 (local time), at the 80th United Nations General Assembly at U.N. headquarters in New York, the president said he would work to ensure that the vision of "AI for all" becomes the new normal for the international community. He added that at the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) summit to be held in Gyeongju in Oct., Korea would share its future vision through the "APEC AI Initiative" and play a role in shaping global AI ethics and norms.
Of next year's AI budget, 2.6 trillion won will go to AI transition (AX) projects that introduce AI into industry, daily life, and the public sector. The government is particularly intent on addressing structural challenges such as low birthrates and aging, and the climate crisis through AI.
Recently, the National AI Strategy Committee also added task forces across three areas—education, security, and regions. They will discuss AI literacy education for elementary and secondary students and the general public, responses to pressing issues regarding the malicious use of AI, and region-based AI projects and policies.
5) Overseas partnerships... “from big tech to asset managers”
The new administration is also active in attracting strategic investment from overseas companies. The president's first AI-related move was attending a launch ceremony in Ulsan in Jun. for an AI data center by SK Group and Amazon Web Services (AWS).
During the U.S. visit in Sept., the president met Larry Fink, chairman and chief executive officer (CEO) of BlackRock, the world's largest asset manager, in New York to discuss investment plans in Korea worth tens of trillions of won.
The government also welcomed OpenAI's establishment of a Korea office and its successive announcements of cooperation with major domestic companies such as Kakao, SK Telecom, KRAFTON, Yanolja, and Cafe24. The aim is to grow Korea's AI ecosystem through a combined strategy that pursues both "self-reliance" and "collaboration."
Many experts assessed this policy direction by saying that securing GPUs is an urgent matter. That is because GPUs are a critical resource not only for AI research but also for a wide range of basic science research.
Regarding the physical AI demonstration projects, analysts said, "This is an area where Korea can lead, but it will face multiple challenges in proving effectiveness." They noted that AI solutions that worked at lab scale repeatedly ran into various obstacles in large factories due to increased complexity throughout AI's history.
There were also many opinions that the budget should be expanded for fundamental research with high impact, such as next-generation power grids, energy development, and post-transformer architectures.
Vice Chair Im Moon-young said, "The responsibility is heavy and there is much to do," adding, "We plan to present a concrete AI action plan by Nov."