Chey Tae-won, chairman of the Korea Chamber of Commerce and Industry and SK Group, said that cooperation with Japan is necessary to compete with China, which has emerged as the most threatening entity in manufacturing artificial intelligence (AI).

At the summer forum of the Korea Chamber of Commerce and Industry held in Gyeongju on the 18th, Chey held an AI talk concert with Chung Shina, CEO of Kakao, and said, "The biggest threat in manufacturing AI is becoming China. We need to be superior to China to survive."

Chey Tae-won (right), the Chairman of the Korea Chamber of Commerce and Industry, and Chung Shina, the CEO of Kakao, are talking at the management talk show of the KORCHAM summer forum held in Gyeongju on the 18th. /Courtesy of KORCHAM

Chey noted, "Data is incredibly important in manufacturing AI. Korea has rich manufacturing AI data, but recently, looking at China, they have more data than us and their learning ability is improving, which is expected to impact our manufacturing industry."

As a solution to the competition with China, he pointed out the importance of data cooperation with Japan. He stated, "It's important to join hands with Japan, which has a lot of data. If we exchange and learn from each other, we can create better AI." He added, "Without securing data and collaboration, we will lose our competitive edge," and emphasized that "strategic alliances, not exclusive competition, are necessary."

Chey also stressed the need for cultivating AI talent, saying, "We need more than 100,000 AI engineers in Korea, and I believe we will need 1 million or even 10 million in the future," and noted that "we need to keep cultivating the seeds of AI."

He also mentioned the need to actively attract foreign talent, stating, "We must continuously bring brains into Korea to revitalize the economy and create new shelters. Otherwise, it will be difficult to avoid low birth rates, consumption contraction, and education contraction."

During the event, examples of startup representatives utilizing AI in business based on data were also introduced. Yoon Seong-wook, CEO of Laundry Special Force, stated, "The AI is learning 30,000 care labels attached to customers' clothes daily to build a data set. We will use this data to discover new business models, such as predicting future fashion trends."

Kim Jin-woo, CEO of Liner, which provides a service that allows specialized knowledge to be searched using AI, said, "The accumulated specialized knowledge data through web highlighting has been a great help in converting to an AI search engine." He added, "Just deciding how to accumulate and utilize data can create added value through AI so that anyone can challenge it."

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