Seoul: U.S. chip giant Advanced Micro Devices Inc. (AMD) and South Korean artificial intelligence (AI) startup Upstage announced they have expanded their strategic collaboration to accelerate next-generation AI development and support Korea's sovereign AI initiatives. This move marks AMD's increasing presence in the region.
According to Yonhap News Agency, the announcement follows a meeting in Seoul between Upstage CEO Sung Kim and AMD Chair and CEO Lisa Su, where the leaders discussed broader cooperation to drive AI innovation. AMD and Upstage have been strategic partners since AMD participated in Upstage's 62 billion-won (US$41.3 million) Series B bridge investment last year.
Under the expanded collaboration, Upstage will implement AMD's Instinct MI355 accelerators over a multi-phase road map throughout the next year. These graphics processing units (GPUs) aim to enhance Upstage's large language models (LLMs) and document processing engines. The initiative will also aid in developing a sovereign AI model as part of a South Korean government-led AI foundation model project. Upstage has advanced to the project's second round, alongside SK Telecom Co. and LG AI Research.
Through this partnership, AMD and Upstage aim to bolster South Korea's domestic AI ecosystem while diversifying the nation's sovereign AI infrastructure, as stated by the companies. Upstage emphasized that the collaboration, powered by AMD's GPUs, is expected to significantly advance its LLMs and contribute to building the country's sovereign AI model.
"Pairing that with domestic infrastructure gives us the foundation to make Korea a genuinely competitive force in global AI," said Upstage CEO Sung Kim. AMD CEO Lisa Su highlighted Upstage's leadership in AI innovation in South Korea as a key reason for the partnership. "This collaboration brings together AMD Instinct GPUs and the ROCm open software with Upstage's expertise to advance Korea's sovereign AI capabilities and deliver the performance, efficiency, and open ecosystem needed to accelerate AI innovation," she added.
During her visit to South Korea, Su met with influential business leaders, including Samsung Electronics Co. Chairman Lee Jae-yong and Naver Corp. CEO Choi Soo-yeon. On Wednesday, AMD announced an agreement with Samsung Electronics to purchase its high bandwidth memory (HBM) chips for AMD's next-generation GPU, with plans to expand cooperation beyond memory chips to advanced foundry and packaging services.