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SEOUL, March 28 (AJP) - Chey Tae-won, chairman of both the Korea Chamber of Commerce and Industry and the conglomerate SK Group, cautioned on Friday that South Korea risks becoming an "AI-dependent nation" if it fails to develop its own large language models (LLMs).
Speaking at a press conference marking the fourth anniversary of his tenure as chairman of the chamber, Chey assessed South Korea’s current AI capabilities as lagging behind global leaders.
“We rank outside the top 10 globally,” he said. “We need LLMs for the future, and we cannot afford to have none of our own.”
“If we cannot equip ourselves internally with LLMs, we will become dependent,” Chey warned, underscoring the strategic importance of avoiding reliance on foreign-developed AI systems.
LLMs — complex AI systems that learn and reason to interpret and generate human language — have become a key battleground in the global tech race. While American tech companies like OpenAI, Google, and Meta have set the pace, South Korean firms such as Naver and LG are seeking to close the gap by developing their own models.
Chey also raised concerns about the country’s manufacturing competitiveness, saying it was no longer as robust as in previous decades.
“Strong competitors have already begun to emerge,” he said. Rather than focusing solely on preventing domestic factories from relocating abroad, he urged a shift toward boosting productivity and competitiveness through greater AI integration.
“We must reconsider the model of producing goods for export in this land in the same way as before,” he said.
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