South Korea’s Ministry of Science and ICT (MSIT) has chosen Naver Cloud, NHN Cloud, and Kakao as key companions for a large-scale GPU procurement initiative to boost the nation’s AI computing capabilities. The federal authorities will make investments roughly KRW 1.46 trillion (spherical USD 1.1 billion) to build up 13,000 high-performance graphics processing gadgets (GPUs) as part of the nation’s effort to develop its house artificial intelligence infrastructure.
In keeping with the ministry, the GPUs to be procured embrace 10,080 NVIDIA B200 gadgets and three,056 H200 gadgets, which shall be distributed all through the three cloud service suppliers. This enterprise is part of South Korea’s broader method to chop again reliance on overseas computing property, pace up AI innovation, and strengthen the competitiveness of native know-how corporations inside the shortly rising AI sector.
The initiative is designed to fulfill the rising demand for high-performance computing in South Korea’s evaluation, industrial, and tutorial sectors. Following the allocation of a supplementary funds in May, the Ministry of Science and ICT carried out a month-long alternative course of that involved public bidding, proposal assessments, and on-site inspections sooner than finalizing Naver Cloud, NHN Cloud, and Kakao as a result of the enterprise operators.
Over 10,000 GPUs shall be allotted for government-led duties, with the remaining gadgets supporting the operational desires of the three cloud suppliers. The ministry emphasised that these property will primarily drive house AI evaluation, large-scale model teaching, and nationwide AI initiatives.
NHN Cloud will deal with the most important allocation, securing 7,656 B200 gadgets outfitted with water-cooling packages to spice up thermal effectivity. Of these, 6,120 GPUs shall be government-owned and organized into 510-node and 255-node clusters to assist high-performance workloads. NHN Cloud expects to begin beta firms all through the yr, offering early entry to its computing property for select duties.
Naver Cloud will oversee 3,056 H200 gadgets, with 2,296 GPUs allotted to the federal authorities. These things shall be deployed in 255-node and 32-node clusters, aimed towards supporting universities and evaluation institutions. Full-scale firms are anticipated to be on the market by the highest of the yr, guaranteeing that tutorial and public evaluation duties can entry the high-performance infrastructure immediately.
Kakao will deploy 2,424 B200 GPUs, specializing in operational effectivity and supporting government-backed AI initiatives. Of these, 2,040 gadgets shall be government-operated in a single 255-node cluster. Similar to the other suppliers, Kakao plans to launch partial beta firms sooner than the highest of the yr, giving early entry to builders and researchers involved in key duties.
To ensure atmosphere pleasant and equitable helpful useful resource utilization, the ministry and the cloud operators will create a unified GPU assist platform. This on-line system will allow universities, evaluation institutions, and enterprise players to make use of for entry, with allocations based mostly totally on proposal evaluations and enterprise priorities. Idle property shall be dynamically reassigned to prepared candidates, maximizing nationwide utilization of the model new infrastructure.
Formal agreements with the chosen operators and the commencement of procurement are scheduled for early August, with phased deployment anticipated to be completed by the highest of 2025. As quickly as completely operational, the clusters will underpin the federal authorities’s AI Foundation Model Problem and completely different nationwide initiatives. Minister Bae Kyung-hoon described the enterprise as a “catalyst for Korea’s AI ecosystem,” emphasizing that the expansion of GPU property marks the 1st step in direction of setting up an AI superhighway and establishing the nation as a worldwide AI chief.
Image credit score: Nvidia
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