AI 'K-Startup', Nurtured by OpenAI

At OpenAI Headquarters in the US, 'K-Startup & OpenAI Matching Day in US'
Sam Altman CEO Also Visited On-site to Encourage Participating Companies

The Ministry of SMEs and Startups announced that on the 14th (local time), it held the ‘K-Startup & OpenAI Matching Day in US’ event at the headquarters of OpenAI, a global AI leading company located in Silicon Valley, USA. On this day, final presentation evaluations were conducted for startups participating in this year’s global corporate collaboration program to collaborate with OpenAI.

In a public meeting held in June last year, inviting OpenAI CEO Sam Altman, the Ministry of SMEs and Startups agreed to jointly nurture promising Korean startups in the AI field through a global corporate collaboration program with OpenAI. In December, the ‘K-Startup & OpenAI Matching Day’ event was held in Korea, where 220 startups that applied for the collaboration program with OpenAI underwent document screening and preliminary presentation evaluations, resulting in the selection of 14 startups.

The 14 promising AI startups that passed the domestic preliminary round took the stage again this time in front of OpenAI executives at the US headquarters. Following encouragement speeches by Lim Jeong-wook, Director of the Startup Venture Innovation Office at the Ministry of SMEs and Startups, and Lim Jeong-taek, Consul General of the Republic of Korea in San Francisco, the startups gave their presentations, followed by a variety of Q&A sessions with OpenAI executives.

After the presentations, based on on-site evaluations by OpenAI executives, three companies?‘Marinachain’, ‘Waddle’, and ‘Client’?were awarded the ‘Most AGI Potential Award’.

Sam Altman, CEO of OpenAI, is answering questions from the representatives of participating startups at the 'K-Startup & OpenAI Matching Day in US' event held on the 14th (local time) at the OpenAI headquarters in Silicon Valley, USA. (Photo by Ministry of SMEs and Startups)

On the same day, Sam Altman, CEO of OpenAI, also visited the event venue. Sam Altman encouraged the startup representatives and held a Q&A session. The startup representatives asked various questions about the GPT-5 release plan, the future of AI technology, AI chip production, and more, to which Sam Altman responded to each question.

The Ministry of SMEs and Startups selected 10 startups to participate in the 2024 global corporate collaboration program based on evaluations by OpenAI experts and a review of eligibility requirements for the support project. The 10 startups are A-Sleep, Client, DK MediInfo, Marinachain, NextPayments, NineWatt, RunKoreanInKorean, Turing, Waddle, and WeRaiser.

The final selected startups will receive up to 200 million KRW in commercialization funds from the Ministry of SMEs and Startups, and will also receive credits for using OpenAI services, expert mentoring, and consulting support from OpenAI.

Minister Oh Young-joo said, “I hope the startups participating in this event will grow into AI companies with global competitiveness through collaboration with OpenAI,” and added, “The Ministry of SMEs and Startups will continue to expand collaboration with global companies leading each industry, such as OpenAI, to enhance the technological development capabilities of promising domestic startups and to expand their global advancement.”

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