South Korea seeks global tech partnerships to boost AI investment

Lee Jae Myung hosted an AI summit in San Francisco on July 24 as South Korea pressed global tech firms for deeper ties that could give Seoul more leverage in the U.S.-China technology race. The gathering put Nvidia, OpenAI, Anthropic, Broadcom, Samsung Electronics and SK Hynix in the same frame, with South Korea casting itself as a potential hub for AI investment and supply-chain power.

The government’s pitch went beyond diplomacy. Lee’s office linked the visit to three mega projects worth 4,700 trillion won involving Samsung Electronics and SK Group, and Lee has also called for shortening administrative processes for AI mega projects. That combination of faster approvals, large-scale industrial policy and executive access is what Seoul is offering in exchange for partnerships in chips, cloud capacity, model development and other AI infrastructure.

For global companies, the appeal is clear. South Korea is already central to advanced semiconductors and electronics, and its manufacturing base gives AI firms a route into production lines, logistics systems and export-oriented industrial applications. Reuters-linked reporting said Nvidia and SK Group announced a $500 billion-plus initiative, while Seoul said Samsung Electronics and SK Hynix were set to announce major chip deals with U.S. tech companies. NVIDIA said in a blog post that Lee and South Korea’s top business leaders and researchers were meeting with NVIDIA and ecosystem partners to chart Korea’s AI progress.

The summit also showed how Seoul is trying to turn AI policy into national leverage rather than a domestic tech campaign. Reuters had said on July 22 that Lee planned to travel to San Francisco to meet leading U.S. AI executives, and the trip also included planned stops in South America and Germany. ChosunBiz said Lee would meet the heads of Anthropic, OpenAI, Nvidia and Broadcom, underscoring that the government is courting the companies shaping chips, models and deployment platforms at the center of global AI competition.

South Korean media described Lee’s San Francisco message as casting the country as a hub for building, using and sharing AI, while another report said he framed South Korea as an indispensable core nation in the global AI supply chain. The message was aimed at investors and partners alike: Seoul wants access to the most advanced chips and models, but it is also asking multinational firms to anchor more of that value inside South Korea.