Bae Kyung-hoon, Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of Science and ICT, said Korea would "leap beyond being one of the top three in artificial intelligence (AI) to become the world's leading nation in physical AI," in an opening address at the launch ceremony for Phase 2 of the Physical AI Alliance, held Wednesday at The Plaza Hotel in Jung-gu, Seoul. In his address, Bae stressed that "to stay ahead in the physical AI competition, we must possess both independent technological capabilities and a foundation for industrial diffusion."
The government believes the center of gravity in the global AI competition is shifting beyond digital space to physical AI that operates in the real world. It plans to concentrate its policy capabilities on identifying core technologies that can boost productivity at major industrial sites such as manufacturing, autonomous driving, shipbuilding, and defense, and on applying them to actual fields.
The Ministry of Science and ICT launched Phase 1 of the Physical AI Alliance in September last year, identifying demand and difficulties at industrial sites and discussing policy directions. The newly launched Phase 2 is characterized by moving beyond the discussion stage to practical use stages such as actual technology development, on-site application, and standardization. The government plans to upgrade the Phase 2 alliance into a "physical AI total solution platform for securing the K-Physical AI full stack and building and diffusing it at industrial sites."
Bae began his address by saying, "I will speak freely without looking at a script." Referring to the recent export restrictions surrounding advanced AI technologies such as "Mythos 5," he stressed that "if we lose the initiative now, we will end up depending on someone else or doing only peripheral work." Bae particularly cited data as the core of physical AI competitiveness. "We must have a data acquisition system in place to enable preemptive research," he said. "The work of securing data from the field and creating synthetic data through virtual simulation must come first before we can prepare for the next stage." This means that physical AI technology can only be advanced by securing real-world data and combining it with simulation and synthetic data.
Ahead of the event, attendees also observed demonstrations of physical AI robots by RealWorld and Maum AI. At the site, Ryu Jung-hee, CEO of RealWorld, explained that "this is a technology that learns data secured at manufacturing sites and augments it so that physical AI can be used universally," adding that "it is more advanced than the method of directly training hundreds of physical AI units in a huge factory."
The government's first goal is to secure the "K-Physical AI full stack" to reduce dependence on foreign solutions. The idea is to connect domestic AI semiconductors, AI models, software, and robot and machine control technologies to implement core physical AI technologies within the domestic ecosystem. Furthermore, the Phase 2 alliance will expand beyond cooperation centered on technology development into a full-cycle cooperation platform encompassing communications networks, system integration, data centers, security, standards, certification, and operation. The scope of physical AI application will also broaden to all industrial sectors, including logistics, agriculture, healthcare, defense, administration, and disaster safety. It will serve as a higher-level cooperation platform that connects demand from various industries with technology supply capabilities to identify and diffuse actual projects.
"When we first launched the Physical AI Alliance in September last year, physical AI was still an unfamiliar concept to many, but in less than a year it has emerged as a core paradigm in the global AI competition," Bae said. "This reorganization is meaningful in that the alliance has formed itself into a physical AI total solution platform that connects technology development achievements to actual fields and feeds the data and demand arising from the field back into technology development."
Meanwhile, the launch ceremony was attended by some 200 people, including National Assembly members Chung Dong-young, Choi Hyung-doo, and Hwang Jung-a; Cho Jun-hee, chairman of the Korea Software Industry Association (KOSA); and officials from industry, academia, research institutes, and related agencies.
