President Lee Jae Myung heads to AI summit with Nvidia, OpenAI chiefs to boost South Korea's role

South Korea's Lee to visit South America and Germany, attend AI summit in US

SEOUL, July 22 (Reuters) - South Korean President Lee Jae Myung will visit San Francisco, Brazil, Chile, Argentina and Germany from July 24 to August 3, the presidential office said on Wednesday. Lee will hold separate summits with the leaders of Brazil, Chile and Argentina and attend an AI summit in San Francisco, National Security Adviser ⁠Wi Sung-lac said in a press briefing. The presidential office said Lee is also scheduled to meet Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang, OpenAI CEO Sam Altman and Anthropic CEO Dario Amodei, while Samsung Electronics Chairman Jay Y. Lee, SK Group Chairman Chey Tae-won and Hyundai Motor Executive Chair Euisun Chung will also attend the AI summit. South Korea is eyeing an expansion of trade and ⁠business in South America, Wi said, seeking fresh negotiations for the South Korean-Mercosur trade agreement as well as modernisation of a free trade agreement with Chile. Seoul is also aiming to enhance cooperation in ⁠energy and food, Wi said, citing abundant reserves of critical minerals in the region. In San Francisco, Lee will meet with executives of six ⁠top venture capital firms, including Andreessen Horowitz, General Catalyst and Sequoia Capital. He will attend an MOU ceremony between South Korea's ⁠National Pension Service and the venture capital firms for long-term partnership, and then attend a roundtable, the presidential office said. Reporting by Kyu-seok Shim and Heejin Kim Editing by Ed Davies Our Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles., opens new tab

President Lee, biz leaders to meet Nvidia, OpenAI chiefs in San Francisco - The Korea Times

President Lee Jae Myung, right, listens to a participant's remark during a discussion meeting on regional, essential and public healthcare at Cheong Wa Dae in Seoul, Wednesday. Yonhap President Lee Jae Myung and Korean business leaders will meet with executives of Big Tech firms during his visit to the United States later this week, his office said Wednesday, highlighting Korea's growing role in the global artificial intelligence (AI) industry and strengthening ties with key players in the sector. Lee will embark on a five-nation trip on Friday, visiting Brazil, Chile, Argentina, Germany and the U.S. National Security Adviser Wi Sung-lac and presidential chief of staff for policy Kim Yong-bum said Lee will meet Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang, OpenAI CEO Sam Altman, Anthropic CEO Dario Amodei and Broadcom CEO Hock Tan in separate meetings in San Francisco. The presidential office said the meetings are part of the president's schedule to engage with global AI leaders and Silicon Valley venture capitalists. "Through meetings with CEOs of global Big Tech companies, the president will emphasize Korea's commitment to AI investment and global cooperation while securing tangible outcomes such as investment partnerships from key enterprises," Kim said. The presidential office said Lee will also attend the San Francisco AI Summit on Friday (local time) and meet Samsung Electronics Executive Chairman Lee Jae-yong, SK Group Chairman Chey Tae-won, Hyundai Motor Group Executive Chair Chung Euisun and Naver Board Chair Lee Hae-jin to discuss mega-scale AI projects for Korea. It said the president will witness the signing of partnerships between the Korean firms and the tech giants and announce a proclamation at the summit that Korea will become an "irreplaceable" state in the global AI mainstream. Aside from the president, the heads of Samsung Electronics, SK Group, Hyundai Motor Group and Naver are expected to meet the CEOs of Nvidia, OpenAI, Anthropic and Broadcom at the summit, marking a rare gathering of global AI industry leaders. A roundtable-style meeting will take place, with discussions expected to focus on ways to strengthen cooperation in memory chips, graphics processing unit (GPU) infrastructure and generative AI services amid growing demand for AI technologies. The gathering would be unprecedented, bringing together leaders of the world's two largest memory chipmakers, Samsung Electronics and SK Group's SK hynix, AI chip leader Nvidia, and generative AI developers Naver, OpenAI and Anthropic. Just over a month ago, Huang visited Korea and held separate meetings with leaders from Samsung, SK, Hyundai, LG and Naver. This upcoming gathering in the U.S. reaffirms Nvidia's commitment to strengthening partnerships with Korean firms that are now seen not just as memory suppliers but as essential partners in the global AI infrastructure ecosystem. Samsung Electronics and SK hynix already supply high-bandwidth memory (HBM) and other advanced memory products to Nvidia. HBM4 chips from Samsung Electronics and SK hynix are slated for inclusion in Nvidia's next-generation AI accelerator, Vera Rubin, which is expected for market launch in the second half of this year. Samsung and SK are also memory suppliers for OpenAI's proprietary AI chips and signed an agreement last year to provide high-performance memory for Stargate, a multibillion-dollar AI infrastructure project. Beyond memory, collaboration in foundry services is also expanding. Samsung is producing Nvidia's inference-focused language processing unit, Grok 3, and is currently in talks with Anthropic to manufacture AI chips using its 2-nanometer process. This reflects a broader trend of Korean firms playing increasingly strategic roles across the AI value chain. Naver is expected to discuss cooperation on its "AI factory" initiative which integrates GPU servers, data centers and power/cooling infrastructure with AI models and cloud technology to support large-scale AI computation. Industry observers suggest the meeting could also help allay recent concerns about a potential AI peak-out as demand for AI infrastructure remains robust and memory shortages are projected to persist into 2027. With leaders from the memory, GPU and generative AI sectors convening in one place, this summit is poised to signal a new phase of strategic alignment in the global AI market, in which Korean companies are positioned as core enablers of the AI era. Industry observers believe the meeting is likely to send a strong signal to the market that AI demand and investment capacity will remain robust over the next two to three years, going beyond simply reinforcing cooperation on AI infrastructure. Some industry executives noted that with stock prices having fallen by double digits from their highs, the summit could help ease peak-out fears if it leads to a more concrete road map for AI infrastructure investment and clearer directions for collaboration.