Seoul: Artificial intelligence (AI) chip demand is expected to continue, and OpenAI will continue to prioritize partnerships with South Korean companies in the semiconductor supply chain, the company's regional head said Wednesday. Kim Kyung-hoon, the general manager of OpenAI Korea, made the remarks at a press conference held in Seoul to mark the regional office's first year since its establishment.
According to Yonhap News Agency, Kim emphasized the importance of advanced semiconductors in enabling faster and more intricate AI processing, reaffirming market optimism for an AI memory boom. This follows the debut of OpenAI's latest AI model, GPT-6 Astra, unveiled early this month. The announcement had a notable impact on the stock market, with shares of Samsung Electronics Co. and SK hynix Inc. rising over 3 percent and 5 percent, respectively, on the rollout day.
Kim also addressed the South Korean government's initiative to invest in the development of homegrown frontier AI models. He expressed a positive outlook, noting that it not only expands user options but also fosters the growth of South Korea's entire AI ecosystem, from the semiconductor supply chain to AI-related talent. At the conference, OpenAI shared its accomplishments in South Korea over the past year, highlighting a significant increase in users of its enterprise-grade ChatGPT models.
The data showed a 28-fold increase in users as of the end of August, while users of ChatGPT Work and OpenAI's coding agent, Codex, grew 14 times over the past six months. Weekly active users for its general-purpose ChatGPT models in South Korea rose 35 percent on-year as of August 25, according to the company.
OpenAI anticipates this trend will accelerate with the deployment of GPT-6 Astra and is focused on supporting inference residency. The company is also working to expand its cybersecurity project "Daybreak Partner" with local firms. Additionally, OpenAI is preparing to enhance its local team dedicated to its advertisement business, following the rollout of its ad-supported AI service for lower-tier ChatGPT models in South Korea in mid-June.