The National Growth Fund will invest 560 billion won ($413 million) in Upstage, a South Korean artificial intelligence (AI) company.
The Financial Services Commission (FSC) said Monday it approved the 560 billion won investment in Upstage at a fund management review committee meeting held on the 30th of last month.
The Advanced Strategic Industry Fund will contribute 100 billion won, while the Korea Development Bank (30 billion won) and private investors including SK Networks and Mirae Asset (430 billion won) will add another 460 billion won. Upstage is a venture firm that develops AI solutions and large language models (LLMs). Its corporate value is estimated at 1.3 trillion won. The FSC said, "We expect this investment to help strengthen sovereign AI competitiveness."
The FSC also approved an equity investment in the Solaseado National AI Computing Center in South Jeolla Province, a 250 billion won low-interest loan to a POSCO Future M subsidiary, an 85 billion won low-interest loan to ST Gen Bio, and a 16.5 billion won low-interest loan to Foosung. The total amount deployed by the National Growth Fund through April this year reaches 8.4 trillion won.
