# Degrees no longer required at SK hynix as AI hiring race intensifies > Source: > Published: 2026-06-17 02:46:39+00:00 SK hynix is removing all academic qualification requirements from its recruitment process, starting with a new round of open hiring that opened Wednesday. The world's leading maker of high bandwidth memory, the chips that feed Nvidia's artificial intelligence accelerators, says it will judge applicants on job skills and growth potential rather than degrees. Lines such as "open to applicants with a four-year bachelor's degree or higher" have been deleted from postings. Anyone whose experience, competencies and cultural fit match a role can now apply and be hired, the company said, with the change set to extend across all future recruitment. In an unusual move for off-cycle hiring, SK hynix plans to recruit in the hundreds for core functions including next-generation chip design. Document submissions run through June 23. The shift tracks closely with the talent priorities of SK Group Chairman Chey Tae-won, who has described the capabilities future workers need as a set of "muscles": a thinking muscle for questioning and probing fundamentals, an adaptation muscle for moving quickly through technological change and an empathy muscle for flexible collaboration across differences. "In a fast-changing AI environment, the competitiveness of future talent is hard to capture through a specific degree or standardized credentials," an SK hynix official said. The change carries weight beyond corporate human resources in a country where credentials run deep. Data from the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development puts South Korea's tertiary educational attainment among 25-to-34-year-olds at 71 percent, the highest in the bloc, and the organization has linked persistent youth unemployment to a mismatch between schooling and the labor market. It also lands against an extraordinary hiring backdrop. SK hynix added more than 2,000 workers last year even as the broader job market slowed, and in 2025 it topped a survey of college students' most-desired employers for the first time, with respondents citing generous pay. The company drew record performance bonuses of 2,964 percent of monthly base pay after all-time-high 2025 earnings, coming out to roughly 148 million won ($98,000) for an employee earning 100 million won annually, sharpening the appeal of an already coveted workplace. mjh@heraldcorp.com