Bae Kyung-hoon, deputy prime minister and minister of science and ICT, speaks at a meeting on building an open AI computing infrastructure ecosystem held at the HJ Business Center in Jongno-gu, Seoul, on the 20th. Yonhap News
SK Telecom (017670), Kakao (035720) and KT (030200) have been selected to run “AI for All,” a government project offering free artificial intelligence services to every citizen in South Korea. Technical convenience and differentiated service plans decided the outcome.
The Ministry of Science and ICT said on the 28th that it chose consortiums led by SK Telecom, Kakao and KT as project operators after written and presentation reviews of the six bidders that entered the competition. Six companies — SK Telecom, MKD, ESTsoft, Xenon, Kakao and KT — submitted proposals before the call closed on the 18th.
The written review assessed technical suitability, including the competitiveness of AI models and services and plans for graphics processing unit deployment and infrastructure operation. The presentation review, which included video demonstrations of prototypes, weighed service convenience and user acquisition strategies, plans to ensure service quality and safety, and contributions to the broader AI ecosystem.
The ministry said the winning bidders scored highly for proposing general-purpose AI chatbot services that surpass foreign AI, public AI agents that handle complex application procedures so citizens do not miss out on benefits, and differentiated specialized services developed with startups.
Image created by ChatGPT
SK Telecom’s consortium plans to develop an action-oriented AI service that handles everything from drawing up a plan to carrying it out and confirming the result, all from a single request. Users will be able to access it by phone call and text message as well as through apps and the web, making it easy for older people to use. The service will offer conversation and search quality tailored to domestic administrative procedures and local daily life.
Kakao’s consortium plans to offer a service that combines a general-purpose chatbot and AI agents on the messenger app that citizens use every day. Together with LG Uplus, it will release a Lite version of a general-purpose phone-based AI service this year and expand it in stages.
KT’s consortium is developing an AI service that supports information searches, comparison and decision-making, along with the execution and management of public and specialized services, all within a single conversation. It aims to make the AI chatbot readily available not only on the Daum portal and app but also on sites such as Danawa, Musinsa and Zigbang.
The ministry plans to sign agreements with the three operators in September and formally launch the AI for All service this year following a beta period. To that end, it will provide the three companies with a combined 512 B200 GPUs this year and will fund the cost of serving the entire population through the government budget starting next year. The ministry is also holding talks with related agencies on linking public data.