SK Hynix Wins the "Nobel Prize of Semiconductors" Also Awarded to Intel and Apple (Comprehensive)

SK Hynix Wins IEEE Corporate Innovation Award

"Enabling AI Computing with HBM"

Jensen Huang to Receive 'Medal of Honor'

SK Hynix and NVIDIA Recognized for Pioneering the AI Era

In March, at the GTC 2026 event held in San Jose, USA, Jensen Huang, CEO of NVIDIA, is visiting the SK Hynix booth together with Chey Tae-won, Chairman of SK Group.

SK Hynix is set to receive a technology innovation award from the world’s most prestigious engineering organization, in recognition of developing the world’s first High Bandwidth Memory (HBM)—a core component for the age of artificial intelligence (AI)—and establishing a mass production system for it.

According to industry sources on April 24, SK Hynix is slated to receive the technology innovation award at the “IEEE Awards” ceremony hosted by the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers (IEEE), which will be held in New York, USA, on April 24 (local time).

The IEEE cited SK Hynix’s development and proliferation of HBM technology, which enabled AI computation, as the reason for the award. HBM is a type of memory that alleviates the speed bottleneck that occurs when AI processes large volumes of data simultaneously. Conventional memory suffered from the so-called “memory wall” phenomenon, where the speed at which data could be exchanged limited computational performance. HBM is a technology that overcomes this limitation. The IEEE recognized SK Hynix for commercializing and distributing this technology, as well as expanding its application to global AI systems, thereby contributing to the advancement of AI infrastructure.

The IEEE Corporate Innovation Award, established in 1985, is presented to companies that have achieved the most technologically impactful innovations on a global scale. The selection process is known to be extremely rigorous, with strict evaluation criteria, earning the award the reputation of being the “Nobel Prize of the semiconductor and electronics engineering sectors.”

In fact, past recipients of the award have been limited to global tech giants leading the market, such as Intel (2016), Apple (2020), TSMC (2021), and AMD (2025). For a Korean company, this is the first win in 16 years since Samsung Electronics received the award for mobile WiMAX technology in 2010. Notably, SK Hynix is the first Korean company to receive this award for core technologies in memory semiconductors and AI infrastructure.

At this year’s ceremony, Jensen Huang, CEO of NVIDIA, will also receive the highest honor, the “Medal of Honor.” Thus, at the same event where SK Hynix will be awarded the technology innovation award, CEO Jensen Huang will be presented with the top prize.

Jensen Huang’s award announcement was first made at CES in Las Vegas in January of this year, and he will receive the medal in person at this ceremony. He is being recognized for pioneering the era of generative AI with the GPU-based computing architecture.

This year’s awards carry special significance, as SK Hynix and NVIDIA each represent a key pillar of the AI industry. While NVIDIA paved the way for AI computation with its GPUs, SK Hynix expanded that path into a superhighway through HBM technology.

Kim Joungho, professor at KAIST and a key figure in the development of HBM, commented on SK Hynix’s award: “As the era of AI agents unfolds and the required KV cache capacity for computation continues to grow, SK Hynix’s HBM memory technology is becoming even more crucial.”

The IEEE is the world’s largest technical professional organization, boasting more than 500,000 members worldwide. It operates technical standards, academic activities, and awards programs with the mission of advancing technology for humanity.

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