Ministry of Science and ICT Urges Use of Domestic AI Semiconductors in Public Sector

"Initial Demand Needed for Demonstration"

[Asia Economy Reporter Cha Min-young] The Ministry of Science and ICT announced on the 2nd that at the 4th Central-Local Policy Council, it requested participants to apply domestically produced artificial intelligence (AI) semiconductors in the public sector.

This council is a forum where related government ministries and 17 metropolitan cities and provinces participate to discuss cooperation requests from central ministries and proposals from local governments.

Although domestic companies such as Furiosa, Sapeon, Rebellion, DeepX, Telechips, and the Electronics and Telecommunications Research Institute (ETRI) have launched AI semiconductors, the Ministry of Science and ICT explained that initial demand is necessary for product performance verification and device/service demonstration. Accordingly, the ministry requested that domestically produced AI semiconductors be utilized in projects promoted by local governments, such as intelligent closed-circuit (CC)TV and smart cities.

The Ministry of Science and ICT asked local governments to revise bidding announcements for informatization projects, which sometimes specify particular foreign products or model names, so that domestic AI semiconductors can participate in the projects if they meet the required performance. It also requested consideration of measures to encourage and prioritize the use of domestic AI semiconductors, such as applying preferential purchasing when new technology or new product certification is obtained.

To foster the growth of the domestic AI semiconductor industry, the Ministry of Science and ICT plans to start building an 'NPU (Neural Processing Unit) Farm' (a cloud platform based on AI semiconductors) next year, based on domestically produced AI semiconductors, and to promote the 'AI+ Chip Project,' which uses domestic semiconductors in AI products.

Park Yoon-kyu, the 2nd Vice Minister of the Ministry of Science and ICT, said, "As AI utilization spreads across industries, demand related to AI semiconductors is rapidly increasing," and added, "The government will actively support so that our country can take the lead in the next-generation AI semiconductor market."

This content was produced with the assistance of AI translation services.