Overview
<cite index="7-1">South Korean President Lee Jae-myung announced a ₩1,350 trillion (roughly $880 billion) ten-year public-private plan for semiconductors, artificial intelligence (AI) data centers, and robotics on June 29.</cite> <cite index="6-19,6-20">Lee branded the effort the "Three Mega Projects," structured around three pillars: semiconductors, AI data centers, and physical AI.</cite>
Semiconductor Manufacturing
<cite index="3-5,3-6,3-7">A significant portion of the spending is earmarked for semiconductor manufacturing. Samsung Group and SK Group plan to build two new chip fabrication plants each in the country's southwest, with a combined value of about 800 trillion won. The goal is to rapidly expand capacity as demand accelerates for memory chips that power AI systems, particularly high-bandwidth memory (HBM) used in intensive computing applications.</cite> <cite index="5-9,5-10,5-11">The government will fast-track permits and build power and water infrastructure for the new fabs, a process that could pull construction timelines forward by as much as 12 years.</cite>
Data-Center Capacity
<cite index="8-5">The government aims to invest 550 trillion won in AI data-center capacity of 8.4 gigawatts (GW) by 2029, and expand that capacity to 18.4 GW by 2035, bringing total investment to more than 1 quadrillion won nationwide.</cite> <cite index="6-3">SK Group, GS Group, and internet leader Naver are among the companies contributing to the data-center pillar.</cite> <cite index="5-13,5-14">Samsung's total investment plan for the next ten years is nearly 1,000 trillion won, covering AI data centers, chip factories, batteries, display technology, robotics, and industrial infrastructure.</cite>
Physical AI and Robotics
<cite index="5-19,5-20">South Korea aims to grow its share of the global humanoid robot market from 1 percent in the prior year to 20 percent, with the government planning to purchase humanoid robots for education, defense, and disaster response.</cite> <cite index="6-5,6-6">Science Minister Bae Kyung-hoon called the next three years the "golden time" to lead physical AI and said Seoul would designate it a national strategic industry, with the science ministry targeting development of a general-purpose "world model" for physical AI once grid infrastructure is ready.</cite>
Geopolitical Context
<cite index="6-24,6-25">At about $880 billion, the plan equals roughly 5 percent of South Korea's 2024 economic output and dwarfs a $450 billion chip blueprint from 2021 and a $400 billion package from 2023.</cite> <cite index="6-31,6-32">The announcement lands as the United States channels funding through its CHIPS and Science Act and China drafts a $295 billion AI buildout, while Japan continues lifting chip subsidies.</cite> <cite index="10-2">SK Group Chairman Chey Tae-won said the investments are intended to transform South Korea "from an AI consumer country to an AI exporter."</cite>
Infrastructure Risks
<cite index="7-9">Samsung and SK Hynix have pulled fab completion dates forward by as much as 12 years, while the transmission lines and water pipelines those fabs depend on remain years behind schedule.</cite> <cite index="6-29">Analysts have flagged the danger of future oversupply if memory demand cools.</cite> <cite index="10-6,10-7">The headline investment figures should be viewed as strategic roadmaps rather than near-term capital expenditure commitments, as the plans span many years and remain subject to market conditions, customer demand, financing, and government support.</cite>
NVIDIA Partnership
The June 2026 plan builds on an earlier hardware agreement. <cite index="12-1">The Korean government, through the Ministry of Science and ICT (MSIT), has been investing in sovereign AI infrastructure with over 50,000 of the latest NVIDIA graphics processing units (GPUs) to be deployed across the National AI Computing Center and Korean cloud service providers NHN Cloud, Kakao Corp., and NAVER Cloud.</cite> <cite index="12-7">NAVER Cloud, LG AI Research, SK Telecom, NC AI, Upstage, and NVIDIA are also developing Korean-language foundation large language models (LLMs) to accelerate Korean AI applications through public-private partnerships.</cite>