GWANGJU < invest Korea

A Silicon Valley research institute and a venture firm in America began to move for giving support to Gwangju City

On Oct 7, the city officially announced that the mayor reached a technology sharing agreement with PARC, Palo Alto Research Center to study aritifical intelligence technology. The city also signed an investment MOU for corporate development with Builders VC.

As part of project to facilitate Gwangju AI-tech cluster, a process to build up industrial complex to research cutting edge technology, PARC is about to share a program commercially available to local startups and SMEs. Technology trasfer for the newest products and services appears to be made this time.

Palo Alto Research Center, formerly Xerox PARC formed in 1970, has been tasked with creating computer technology-related products and hardware systems such as laser printing and Ethernet. It is said that earliest design for a tabletstyle computer also came from Xerox PARC. It is 19 years ahead of the first debute of Apple's i-pad in the world.

PARC is now reponsible for developing and maturing advances in science and business concepts, mainly focusing on AI technology that can be commercially applicable for cosmetics, metal molding and camera business.

Builders VC is a venture capital firm, helping highly capable startups with full potential raise fund for stable growth of business. While joining the MOU ceremony to partner the city, they are now closely looking into how competent the local startups are and whether to push for the actual investment plan. To give detailed information on investment, heads of promising local businesses -Neton, GIT, Geniesoft - opened a special session for briefing, also inviting a world prominent super-computer specialist and adviser of AI technology for the city, Kim Moon-Joo.

The mayor of the city said "by having such a great opportunity to build a collaborative foundation with two investment partnerts, Gwangju city seems to gain momentum to push for the project to establish AI-tech cluster. This will be a great moment fueling energy for many young Koreans who want to start business, closely linked to AI technology."

Source : Yonhap news (Oct. 8 2019)

** This article was translated from Korean.