Growth of Companies in Gwangju AI Cluster Accelerates Rapidly

Persona AI - Joint Research and Commercialization with Microsoft

TwoDigit, 95-Day Reign as No.1 in the Mega Language Model World Championship

Gwangju Company 'SOS Lab' Successfully Enters KOSDAQ Market

The growth of artificial intelligence (AI) companies in the Gwangju AI Cluster is becoming increasingly evident.

In particular, the Gwangju AI industry convergence ecosystem is showing remarkable growth indicators such as investment and sales, as not only core infrastructure but also companies, talent, and technology are gathering.

National AI Data Center.

The Gwangju Metropolitan City (Mayor Kang Gi-jung), together with the Ministry of Science and ICT, the National IT Industry Promotion Agency, and the AI Industry Convergence Project Group, has been promoting the "Gwangju AI-Centered Industry Convergence Cluster" (hereinafter AI Cluster) since 2020, leading the cultivation of the AI industry convergence ecosystem and sustaining the growth of AI companies.

AI companies in the Gwangju area are broadly categorized into AI Cluster-supported companies, companies attracted to Gwangju, and native Gwangju AI companies.

First, 2Digit Co., Ltd., a Gwangju-attracted company that ranked high in domestic and international AI machine reading competitions, demonstrated outstanding technological capabilities by maintaining first place for 95 consecutive days from March 24 to June 27 in the global "Open LLM Leaderboard" competition hosted by the U.S. company Hugging Face.

The Open LLM Leaderboard is a platform operated by Hugging Face, a U.S. AI and natural language processing (NLP) technology company, which tracks, evaluates, and ranks the performance of various open-source large language models (LLMs).

Infinite Information Technology Co., Ltd., a spatial information-related company, has shown growth by receiving support from the AI Cluster since 2020 and signing a business agreement with Gwangju City. Its sales increased by 182%, from 2.993 billion KRW in 2019 to 5.449 billion KRW in 2023, and it even established a Gwangju corporation.

Persona AI Co., Ltd., a Gwangju-attracted company that was selected as a Top 3 startup at the 2022 Korea-U.S. New York Early-Stage Startup Summit, has established a joint research and commercialization partnership with Microsoft (MS) and ChatGPT, and currently operates a Gwangju corporation.

The Gwangju AI Cluster also contributes to the growth of early-stage startups.

Innoditech Co., Ltd. developed an "AI-based Optimal Teeth Arrangement Recommendation Solution" and signed a business agreement with Gwangju City. This company’s annual sales, which were only 42 million KRW in 2022, increased approximately eightfold to 330 million KRW in 2023, demonstrating the AI Cluster’s significant contribution to the growth of small-scale companies.

ConnexioH Co., Ltd. received a 1 billion KRW investment from the AI Cluster’s AI investment fund for its e-commerce-related AI service "Memopan." Its sales rose 596%, from 73 million KRW in 2022 to 441 million KRW in 2023, and it was selected as one of the Top 50 startups in the startup category at the "2024 MWC Barcelona" (4YFN Awards).

The growth of native Gwangju AI companies is also clear.

SOS Lab Co., Ltd., founded in Gwangju and supported by the AI Cluster for commercialization in 2023, has succeeded in attracting a total investment of 53.7 billion KRW with its LiDAR sensor and related solutions.

Since 2020, it has grown at an average annual rate of 62.8%, and in 2023, it was awarded "Top 10 Automotive Sensor Solutions" by the U.S. global automotive industry magazine Autotech Outlook, transforming into a global LiDAR company. Notably, SOS Lab was listed on KOSDAQ on June 25, attracting great attention for its high growth potential.

IndieJay Co., Ltd. is gaining attention as a representative company of Gwangju, a culture-centered city, by combining AI with cultural content.

Its AI music recommendation radio streaming service "IndieJay" was recognized for innovation in two fields?content & entertainment and mobile devices & apps?and won the CES Innovation Award for two consecutive years starting in 2023.

Pelemed Co., Ltd. commercialized the AI-based high-efficiency new drug development platform "AHEDD" and successfully attracted 12 billion KRW in investment. Recently, based on research and development (R&D), it received clinical trial approvals (IND) from both Korea and the U.S. FDA for preclinical studies of acute myeloid leukemia treatment substances and plans to proceed with global clinical trials.

Park Seok-jun, CEO of 2Digit, said, "The reason why startups like 2Digit were able to break the 80-point barrier on the LLM board for the first time in the world and maintain first place for a long time in international AI competitions was because we could enhance our technological capabilities by utilizing the computing resources of the AI Cluster." He added, "I strongly recommend that more companies come to Gwangju to receive such infrastructure and support."

Lee Sang-gap, Deputy Mayor of Culture and Economy, said, "Many companies are writing success stories in the Gwangju AI Cluster, creating an ecosystem of diversity, mutual cooperation, innovation, and leadership." He added, "We will do our best to build a foundation in the Gwangju AI industry convergence ecosystem where startups can succeed as global companies based on AI technology."

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