At the CLEVI booth at the 1st Industrial AI EXPO held last September at COEX Magok in Gangseo-gu, Seoul, an official demonstrates a robot equipped with physical AI in operation. /Newsis
[Metro Newspaper] As ‘Physical AI’ is being identified as the next stage of the generative artificial intelligence (AI) era, all capabilities are being concentrated on it, from the government to major IT companies such as Naver and academia, including Seoul National University.
According to reporting by <Metro Economic Newspaper> on the 12th, physical AI refers to an autonomous system that directly applies AI to the physical world, leading from ‘perception→understanding→action’. While conventional AI relies on digital inputs and outputs such as text and images, physical AI detects the actual physical environment through cameras, sensors and actuators, responding in real time or performing tasks.
The reason physical AI is attracting attention is the recognition that changes in real-world spaces, such as robotics, autonomous vehicles and smart logistics, have limitations if they rely solely on AI’s ‘software dimension’. Jensen Huang, CEO of NVIDIA, also recently stressed that “AI technology is now moving beyond the software level and entering a ‘physical AI moment’ in which it directly interacts with the physical world”.
As physical AI emerges as the next-generation technology of the AI era, the government is also adopting it as a key national strategy and undertaking large-scale budget investment.
To advance as one of the world’s top three AI powers, the government has allocated KRW 10.1 trillion, more than three times this year’s KRW 3.3 trillion. To this end, it plans to invest approximately KRW 6 trillion in major industrial sectors, including robotics, automotive and shipbuilding, over the next five years. It also announced that, in addition to the 260,000 NVIDIA GPUs secured at the recent Korea–US summit, the government would purchase a further 15,000 high-performance GPUs, securing a total of 35,000 units ahead of schedule.
In his policy speech to the National Assembly on the 4th, President Lee Jae-myung described next year’s budget proposal as “the Republic of Korea’s first budget proposal opening the AI era” and said, “To become a leading country in physical AI, we will leverage the country’s outstanding manufacturing capabilities and focus investment on key projects.” In step with these government efforts, domestic IT companies are also making aggressive investments to gain an early lead in the physical AI market.
NAVER, which surpassed KRW 3 trillion in quarterly sales for the first time, has announced that it will strengthen its competitiveness in physical AI technology. NAVER CEO Choi Soo-yeon said at the third-quarter earnings announcement on the 5th, "We are confident that our physical AI technology is at a globally leading level," and stated that the company would become a leader in the operating system (OS) and control platform sector, which accounts for approximately 39% of the global robotics market.
To achieve this, NAVER expects that an investment of more than KRW 1 trillion in GPUs alone will be required next year. The core technologies are the robot cloud 'ARC' and the ultra-precise 3D digital twin 'ALIKE'.
CEO Choi emphasised, "'ARC' is a standard OS platform that centrally manages various robots, aiming to play the role of 'Windows' or 'Android' in the robotics industry," adding, "We will secure a new growth engine through this technology."
Academic efforts to support physical AI innovation are also accelerating. Seoul National University will officially launch the 'Seoul National University Robotics Institute (SNU RI)', a research institution specialising in physical AI, next month to secure next-generation AI talent. SNU RI will be led by leading scholars in the global robotics community, including Professor Jongwoo Park (former President of the IEEE Robotics and Automation Society) and Professor Kyu-Jin Cho (incoming President of the IEEE Robotics and Automation Society).
The biggest goal is to retain talented individuals who leave the country. Professor Cho emphasised, "We need to establish a research institute that goes beyond simple research and achieves technological demonstrations or commercialisation results that attract the attention of people around the world." To this end, SNU RI will be operated as an 'open hub' where academia and industry join forces, with AI start-up representatives and external experts mentoring students and helping them launch businesses.
Ha Jung-woo, Senior Secretary to the President for AI and Future Planning, said, "To make the new field known as physical AI a success, we need not only GPU data and algorithms, but also manufacturing plants, industrial environments and the physical world," adding, "Korea has both manufacturing plants and software capabilities, providing the foundation to create a new AI environment."
Reporter Kim Seo-hyeon, Metro신문 [email protected]
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Source: Metro신문 (Reporter Kim Seo-hyeon) | https://www.metroseoul.co.kr/article/20251112500345