Lee Pledges South Korea Will Be Trustworthy AI Chip Supply Base

According to Yonhap, President Lee Jae Myung said South Korea will become a trustworthy production base and supply partner for AI semiconductors as he unveiled the “San Francisco AI Declaration” at a high-level meeting in San Francisco. The event brought together the chiefs of global tech firms and South Korean conglomerates, including Samsung Electronics Chairman Lee Jae-yong and SK Group Chairman Chey Tae-won, while OpenAI CEO Sam Altman and Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang also attended. Lee said South Korea will become an irreplaceable core nation in the AI supply chain, citing the country's competitiveness and production capacity in memory semiconductors. He added that the Republic of Korea aims to establish a world-class AI hub, create new markets for AI use in manufacturing and logistics, and serve as a test bed for AI adoption. The declaration followed South Korea's announcement last month of three megaprojects worth more than 4,000 trillion won ($2.73 trillion) for a semiconductor production cluster, physical AI and AI data centers.