President Lee Jae-myung has abruptly appointed AI expert Ha Jung-woo, a former member of Naver, as the 'AI future planning chief' overseeing the national artificial intelligence (AI) strategy. Ha is regarded as a key figure who led the development of the Korean version of large-scale language models (LLMs).
On the 15th, Chief of Staff Kang Hoon said, "Ha is an expert who proposed the concept of sovereign AI and has led the virtuous cycle strategy between the state and corporations. His rich practical experience from Naver is highly valued for its immediate applicability to national strategy formulation." He added, "President Lee Jae-myung aims for Korea to enter the top three AI nations and emphasized the philosophy of boldly assigning responsibility and authority to those who know the field best."
Ha, who holds a Ph.D. in computer engineering from Seoul National University, has led AI-related work at Naver since 2016 after working as a researcher at Samsung SDS. He has overseen Clova AI Research, the AI Lab, and the Naver Cloud AI Innovation Center, among others.
Ha has also been active as a researcher, publishing over 50 papers at major international AI conferences such as ICLR and CVPR. His papers have been cited approximately 10,000 to 15,000 times. Recently, he was appointed as the principal of the 6th curriculum of the Gwangju AI High School, contributing to the cultivation of AI talent. The industry views Ha as a suitable candidate to design the current government's plan to invest 100 trillion won in AI and enhance policy execution capabilities.
▲Born in 1977 (49 years old) ▲Gudeok High School in Busan ▲Ph.D. in computer engineering from Seoul National University ▲Samsung SDS researcher ▲Head leader of Naver Clova AI Research (Director) ▲Director of Naver Cloud AI Lab ▲Co-chairman of the National Union ▲Commissioner of the Ministry of Science and ICT's Strategic Technology Special Committee ▲Co-director of the Seoul National University-Naver Super-large AI Center ▲Principal of the 6th Gwangju AI High School