Yoo Hoi-jun, Dean of KAIST AI Semiconductor School
Trump-Induced Geopolitical Change Response Forum
“The U.S. needs a complementary role to address subsidies and tariffs”
“AI semiconductors with higher power efficiency than NVIDIA’s GPUs
K-memory advantage could lead technological advancement”
“Potential to target niche areas neglected by the U.S., like AI safety”
In the wake of Donald Trump’s election victory, increasing uncertainties in South Korea-U.S. science and technology cooperation have emerged. Experts suggest that South Korea should enhance its diplomatic negotiation power by leveraging its unique strength in next-generation memory technology that the U.S. requires.
Yoo Hoi-jun, Dean of the AI Semiconductor School at the Korea Advanced Institute of Science and Technology (KAIST), stated at a forum co-hosted by the National Assembly’s Committee on Science, ICT, Broadcasting, and Communications, the Ministry of Science and ICT, and KAIST, “The Trump administration’s budget cuts and reduced national research and development (R&D) capabilities highlight the need to emphasize South Korea’s complementary role in resolving issues related to semiconductor subsidies and tariffs.”
The U.S. government has attracted semiconductor companies like Samsung Electronics and SK Hynix to build manufacturing plants domestically through subsidy programs. It is anticipated that the Trump administration will not only reduce these subsidies but also impose tariffs on imports, thereby decreasing their price competitiveness compared to domestic products. To negotiate subsidies and tariffs, the U.S. needs a reason to cooperate with Korea, and one powerful solution could be South Korea’s next-generation memory technologies like high bandwidth memory (HBM) and processing-in-memory (PIM), according to Yoo.
With the surging demand for AI services, AI semiconductors have emerged as a crucial technology. While NVIDIA dominates the GPU market, advanced semiconductor technologies such as neural processing units (NPU), PIM, and neuromorphic chips, which offer higher power efficiency, are gaining traction, Yoo noted. He particularly highlighted the potential of PIM in which Korea holds an advantageous position.
Yoo explained, “GPUs, originally designed by NVIDIA for gaming, consume significant power for AI tasks. In contrast, PIM, which our government started investing in three years ago, is optimized for AI by integrating computation and storage, unlike GPUs.” Although advanced computational performance is possible, bringing data externally due to the lack of storage functions could result in high power consumption; however, PIM addresses this issue.
He pointed out, “Furthermore, Korea leads the world in memory semiconductor technology, giving us a strong base to lead in the memory-based PIM sector as well. Using this as our leverage, we should negotiate with the U.S.,” he stated. Samsung and SK Hynix are adapting to market changes with next-generation memory HBM, which offers AI-level computational performance by stacking memory chips. SK Hynix plans to supply NVIDIA’s next-gen AI accelerators with HBM4. The expectation is that Korean companies will also take the lead in PIM technology.
Additionally, the session’s other speaker, Kim Hyuk-joong, an associate researcher at the Korea Institute for International Economic Policy’s North American and Europe team, expressed concerns that if a company like ASML, the Dutch EUV lithography equipment maker, was based in Korea, it might have been sold to Chinese companies before its growth. He emphasized the necessity for the Korean government to adopt a proactive supply chain policy similar to the extensive support that helped ASML dominate the EUV market.
Lee Ju-heon, Director of Strategic Technology Development at the Ministry of Science and ICT, suggested that while the Trump administration may focus on short-term technology gains like ultra-large AI models during its term, Korea could target niche areas that require long-term investment such as AI safety and energy-efficient data centers. KAIST President Lee Kwang-hyung emphasized the importance of developing core technologies such as AI and semiconductors to the highest global standards to secure scientific and technological sovereignty and stressed the need to cultivate the necessary scientific and technological talent to achieve this.