SK Group's Chey emphasizes importance of AI transition in address to new recruits

SK Group Chairman Chey Tae-won reiterated the importance of deploying AI in the corporate sphere at a recent meeting with an SK affiliates’ newest recruits.

SK Group Chairman Chey Tae-won speaks to the new employees at SK Telecom Talent Development Institute in Icheon, Gyeonggi. [SK]

SK Group Chairman Chey Tae-won reiterated the importance of deploying AI in the corporate sphere at a recent meeting with SK affiliates’ newest recruits.

“We need to actively utilize AI, even in the most traditional business sectors,” Chey said. SK said on Thursday that Chey recently addressed the new employees at the SK Telecom Talent Development Institute in Icheon, Gyeonggi.

“When a new model emerges, there are many existing systems that need to be changed, and this presents a new opportunity for us. We must seize this moment very quickly.”

The meeting between the group’s chairman and new employees has been a longstanding tradition within the company and has taken place since 1979, with the late chairman Chey Jong-hyun.

Emphasizing the need to transition into an AI company, Chey revealed two advantages of implementing the burgeoning technology: strengthening the competitive edge in the company's respective business sectors and diversifying its business model portfolio.

“We need to approach the matter from the end point, the perspective of our ultimate customers.”

Chey gave examples of its mobile carrier SK Telecom and chipmaker SK hynix. SK Telecom boasts an AI personal assistant known as “A.” and plans to advance its core functions to expand toward areas outside of telecommunications, such as mobile network operations, media, communications and mobility.

“For SK hynix, it needs to think beyond just making AI chips to consider what role it will play in the overall AI infrastructure,” Chey said.

The chairman also emphasized that SK needs to integrate its key business portfolios in liquefied natural gas (LNG), energy storage systems and smart grids for the sustainability of AI data centers.

SK recently unveiled a roadmap to realize Chey’s vision of an AI company. It involves procuring 80 trillion won ($58.5 billion) in funding until 2026 and injecting 103 trillion won into AI and semiconductors, centering on SK hynix over the next five years.

SK Telecom and SK Broadband will invest 3.4 trillion won in AI data centers over the next five years.

The merger of SK Innovation and SK E&S, approved by the respective boards last month, is tipped as the biggest restructure at the country’s second-largest conglomerate in the last two decades.

The merger will lead to the creation of an energy giant with an asset value of 106 trillion won and a combined revenue of 90 trillion won, encompassing industries from oil refining to renewable energy and EV batteries.

The move is also expected to create synergy in establishing energy infrastructure for AI data centers.

BY LEE JAE-LIM [lee.jaelim@joongang.co.kr]