800 Trillion Won 'Second Semiconductor Hub' in Honam Region... President Bows 90 Degrees to 'National Heroes'

[Anchor]

A large-scale investment plan for South Korea's new leap forward has been announced. The core of the plan is an 800 trillion won investment to establish a second semiconductor hub in the Honam region. President Lee Jae-myung referred to Samsung Electronics Chairman Lee Jae-yong and SK Group Chairman Chey Tae-won as "national heroes" and expressed his gratitude with a 90-degree bow.

Reporter Ha Jung-yeon reports.

[Reporter]

The 'Three Mega Projects' national briefing was held at the Blue House on the afternoon of the 29th.

About 100 people attended, including President Lee Jae-myung, Deputy Prime Minister for Economy Koo Yoon-cheol, other government ministers, and business leaders such as Samsung Electronics Chairman Lee Jae-yong and SK Group Chairman Chey Tae-won.

President Lee emphasized that South Korea stands at a turning point for a new great leap, identifying semiconductors, physical AI, and AI data centers as the three pillars of this growth.

[President Lee Jae-myung: Speed is the only way to survive. We must secure the core elements of artificial intelligence faster than any other country.]

The government announced that it would establish a second semiconductor production hub in the Honam region following the one in the capital area, with Samsung Electronics and SK Hynix committing a total of 800 trillion won in investment to the Jeonnam-Gwangju Integrated Special City.

The government also unveiled plans to deploy 1,000 AI robots to industrial sites annually, train 10,000 specialists in physical AI over the next five years to make the industry a 'global leader' by 2030, and invest 550 trillion won to build large-scale AI data centers and develop them into an export industry.

Chairman Lee and Chairman Chey also gave presentations, outlining large-scale investment plans for semiconductors and AI, including the construction of two memory fabs each by Samsung Electronics and SK Hynix in Jeonnam-Gwangju.

[Lee Jae-yong / Samsung Electronics Chairman: Among various regions, we are planning Gwangju as a candidate site, expecting advantages in power, water supply, human resources, and significant incentive support.]

[Chey Tae-won / SK Group Chairman: We are planning approximately 1,000 trillion won for the AI data center project and about 1,100 trillion won for the semiconductor supply expansion project.]

According to the government and the two companies, the total investment scale amounts to 896 trillion won for the Honam region, 392 trillion won for the Chungcheong region, and 270 trillion won for the Yeongnam region, the Blue House stated.

[President Lee Jae-myung: On behalf of our business community, I would like to call these two gentlemen national heroes.]

President Lee expressed his gratitude to the two chairmen by bowing 90 degrees to each of them in turn.

[For the future of South Korea (Fighting!)]

Reported by Jung Sang-bo | Video by Nam Il | Graphics by Seo Seung-hyun | Produced by SBS Digital News
※ Please note: This article was translated by AI and may contain errors.