Nvidia Corp has sealed a major deal with South Korea’s largest conglomerates to supply its advanced AI technology, strengthening its global footprint in artificial intelligence infrastructure.
In collaboration with the Ministry of Science and major corporate giants — Samsung Electronics Co, Hyundai Motor Group, and SK Group — Nvidia will deliver over 260,000 AI accelerator chips to power South Korea’s expanding AI ecosystem. Financial details of the deal were not disclosed.
Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang is in South Korea, attending the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation CEO Summit on Friday.
The agreements were formalised during the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) CEO Summit 2025, attended by Nvidia chief executive officer Jensen Huang, who is on an international campaign to promote AI adoption and extend Nvidia’s technological reach.
Under the partnership, the South Korean government plans to establish “sovereign AI” infrastructure, deploying more than 50,000 Nvidia accelerators in national data centres and facilities owned by Kakao Corp, Naver Corp, and NHN Cloud Corp.
“South Korea’s goal is to become the AI capital of the Asia-Pacific region,” President Lee Jae Myung said in a statement.
Samsung Electronics, one of the world’s largest chipmakers, will set up a massive “AI factory” equipped with over 50,000 Nvidia chips. The company is also in discussions to supply next-generation HBM4 memory to Nvidia, aiming to begin mass production soon.
Hyundai Motor Group will deploy a similar number of Nvidia’s Blackwell chips to enhance its AI model development, manufacturing automation, and autonomous driving technologies. Both companies will jointly invest US$3 billion (RM12.6 billion) to build a national AI computing centre in South Korea.
Meanwhile, SK Group, along with its affiliates SK Telecom Co and SK Hynix Inc, will roll out Nvidia’s RTX Pro 6000 Blackwell chips to power Asia’s first “industrial AI cloud”, supporting robotics and advanced AI applications.
The latest wave of deals underscores Nvidia’s dominance in the global AI boom, which has propelled its market capitalisation past US$5 trillion earlier this week.
However, questions remain over whether Nvidia will be allowed to sell its high-end Blackwell processors to China amid ongoing U.S. export restrictions. Huang told Bloomberg News that while he hopes to re-enter the Chinese market, there are currently no concrete plans.
The United States has tightened export controls on advanced AI chips to China. While former U.S. President Donald Trump has expressed openness to discussing the issue with Beijing, it was reportedly not addressed in his recent meeting with President Xi Jinping.
