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President Lee Jae-myung poses for a photo with Samsung Chairman Lee Jae-yong, OpenAI CEO Sam Altman, and SK Chairman Chey Tae-won at the presidential office in Yongsan, Seoul, on October 1. / Source: Presidential Office

President Lee Jae-myung said on October 1 that Samsung Electronics and SK Group will need “enormous resources” to participate in OpenAI’s $500 billion “Stargate Project” in the United States, adding that his government would consider easing Korea’s long-standing finance–industry separation rules to support their investment capacity.

The remarks came during a meeting at the presidential office in Yongsan with OpenAI CEO Sam Altman, attended by Samsung Chairman Lee Jae-yong and SK Chairman Chey Tae-won. OpenAI has agreed to build AI data centers in Jeonnam with SK and in Pohang with Samsung.

Finance–industry separation under review

Presidential policy chief Kim Yong-beom briefed reporters that Altman had signed letters of intent with Samsung and SK to secure high-bandwidth memory (HBM) semiconductors for Stargate, a project that envisions 900,000 wafers—roughly equivalent to the monthly production of the two firms combined.

Lee told executives the scale of investment would be “massive” and suggested that easing finance–industry separation could be one solution, provided safeguards prevent monopoly abuses. The separation rules, known as geumsan bunri, currently restrict industrial conglomerates from owning significant stakes in financial institutions to avoid conflicts of interest.

Shaking hands with Altman, President Lee quipped, “I’m a paid ChatGPT subscriber,” to which Altman replied that Korea has “the highest number of paying subscribers” worldwide. Lee praised Altman’s leadership, saying AI development could have a transformative effect comparable to humanity’s discovery of metals.

Partnership for global AI leadership

Lee stressed that Samsung and SK should play “a core role in the global spread of AI” through their partnership with OpenAI, noting that semiconductor supply is indispensable to the expansion of AI. He highlighted the trilateral HBM supply LOI signed by the firms as a “cooperative partnership that will lead the global market.”

Altman responded that Korea has “an incredible AI ecosystem” and expressed excitement about working with Samsung and SK Hynix. He said the partnerships would advance Stargate, OpenAI’s massive U.S.-based supercomputer and data center project backed by Oracle, SoftBank, Microsoft, Nvidia, and Arm.

Samsung Chairman Lee Jae-yong said he was confident Korea could stand at the forefront of the global AI paradigm through the collaboration. SK Chairman Chey Tae-won added that the partnership could make Korea one of the world’s top three AI powers, pointing to SK’s plan with OpenAI to build an AI data center in southwestern Korea as “a crucial step” toward expanding the country’s AI infrastructure.