The government has narrowed its state-backed project to develop a domestic artificial intelligence (AI) foundation model to three teams led by LG AI Research, SK Telecom and Upstage, eliminating startup Motif Technologies despite its strong showing on global benchmarks. The Ministry of Science and ICT announced Tuesday that the three consortia advanced after the second evaluation of four contenders, which assessed benchmark performance, expert reviews and user experience. The project, launched last year to develop homegrown AI models that can rival leading United States and Chinese models, initially selected five teams for the first stage. But after two teams led by Naver Cloud and NC AI were eliminated in the first evaluation in January, Motif joined the competition through an additional selection process to fill the vacant spot. The four teams submitted their latest models for the second-round assessment. Their models included LG AI Research’s K-EXAONE 2.0, SK Telecom’s A.X K2, Upstage’s Solar Open2 and Motif’s Motif 3. The ministry said all four teams had developed internation
LG, SKT, Upstage advance in Korea’s sovereign AI race