According to Korean media, the Korean Ministry of Science and Information Technology and Google DeepMind signed a memorandum of understanding on expanding cooperation in the field of artificial intelligence.
Google will open an artificial intelligence (AI) complex in South Korea this year, in line with the expanded cooperation of the South Korean government with global AI companies.
Mr. Kim Yong-beom, Chief of the Presidential Office in charge of policy, said that the complex is expected to facilitate cooperation between Google and startups and researchers in South Korea.
Mr. Kim said that Demis Hassabis, co-founder and CEO of Google DeepMind, revealed this plan during a meeting with South Korean President Lee Jae Myung at the Presidential Palace. Google DeepMind is Google's artificial intelligence research unit.
One of the requests from the Korean side is that Google must send at least 10 engineers from its headquarters in the US to Korea. The meeting takes place in the context of South Korea's efforts to become one of the top three world powers in artificial intelligence, along with the US and China.
The Ministry of Science and Information Technology assesses that cooperation with Google DeepMind will promote the "K-Moonshot" project of Korea, a project that combines artificial intelligence and science capabilities to solve major national challenges.
In 2016, Google DeepMind opened an era that is today recognized as the modern era of artificial intelligence, when AlphaGo, an AI chess player, won 4-1 against world-class Korean chess master Lee Se-dol in a five-game match in Seoul.
Later, Google DeepMind demonstrated the potential of applying artificial intelligence in science and technology through the AlphaFold project.
AlphaFold's achievement in solving the long-standing challenge of protein structure prediction helped Hassabis also receive the 2024 Nobel Prize in Chemistry.
The South Korean government aims to use the K-Moonshot project to improve research productivity to the fifth highest level in the world by 2030 and use artificial intelligence (AI) to solve 12 national tasks by 2035, in fields including advanced biotechnology, energy, space and semiconductors.
Hassabis is the latest among the famous AI business leaders that the South Korean president has met, including Sam Altman of OpenAI, Jensen Huang of Nvidia, Masayoshi Son of SoftBank Group and Larry Fink of BlackRock.
