K-Ground Ventures Launches Full-Stack Energy-AI AX Ecosystem

K-Ground Ventures (KGV, CEO Nam-Hoon Cho), a Korean venture capital firm specializing in deep-tech commercialization and IP monetization, announced on December 18 that it has signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) with NX (CEO Ju-Hyun Nam), a leading AI-based Energy Management System (EMS) company for energy savings, and HyperVisual AI (CEO Sam-Yun Jung), an AI semiconductor fabless company, to collaborate on the commercialization of AX (AI Transformation) in the energy sector.   Under the agreement, the three companies will jointly develop and standardize dedicated AI semiconductors (GPNPU) and related technologies to further advance AI EMS solutions, while actively pursuing global market expansion.   NX is drawing significant attention as the only Korean company selected by Global Market Insights as one of the 22 key global EMS companies for 2025. HyperVisual AI is recognized as an innovative company in the GPNPU field optimized for on-device AI environments. EMS experts anticipate that this AX partnership will deliver optimized solutions to power consumption and noise challenges associated with data center construction.   Meanwhile, NX has established an "Energy Neural Network" comprising approximately 300,000 devices installed at customer sites, securing world-class building-level internal energy data. As the company’s business continues to grow rapidly, the scale of its data acquisition is expanding accordingly. Leveraging this data, NX has achieved outstanding results across multiple energy efficiency projects and has positioned itself as a leading unicorn candidate in the rapidly growing EMS sector.   Recently, NX received an "AA" rating for IP value and business feasibility from K-Ground Ventures, an operator of the Scale-Up TIPS program, and successfully attracted investment for its IP project.   Ju-Hyun Nam, CEO of NX, commented: “Through this joint development, NX will enable customers across all environments—including buildings, factories, and homes—to not only reduce energy costs but also eliminate safety concerns such as fire risks, through our advanced energy AI agent, enbrix."   K-Ground Ventures, which spearheaded the MOU, is actively building a new AX investment ecosystem in collaboration with KST (Korea Science & Technology Holdings, CEO Chi-Ho Choi), as well as accelerators (ACs), venture capital firms (VCs), and private equity firms (PEs), particularly in the AI sector.   Nam-Hoon Cho, CEO of K-Ground Ventures, stated: “In the AX era, the shortage of industry-specific AI experts makes it difficult for investors acting alone to identify capable AI companies and connect them with demand-side enterprises to generate meaningful AX outcomes.”   He added: “In the era of the KRW 150 trillion National Growth Fund, it is essential to support AI startups with core technologies and global IP so they can collaborate within a full-stack AX investment ecosystem spanning data, semiconductors and services. Depending on the AX project, we pursue a growth-focused Scale-Up strategy alongside a Scale-Out strategy centered on expansion and standardization, enabling bold and timely investments at each stage of growth."   Cho further explained: “The AX-dedicated fund currently under development will provide both public and private support—including programs such as TIPS and Scale-Up TIPS—as well as investment opportunities for domestic and global startups proposing innovative full-stack AX projects aligned with global demand. Once predefined milestones are achieved, follow-on investment through the AX-dedicated fund and the investment consortium will enable early realization of collaborative outcomes, ultimately evolving into a Korean-style global AX investment ecosystem model." -End-    정현식 기자ecosystem ventures ground ventures energy sector energy management

2025.12.18. 21:13

Era of 100 Trillion KRW in AI Investment: Korea Builds Investment Ecosystem for World-Class Physical AI Startups

As the era of 100 trillion KRW in AI investment begins, an investment ecosystem is being built in Korea for world-class domestic startups leading the Physical AI market.    KGround Ventures, a deep-tech commercialization-focused venture capital firm and operator of the Scale-Up TIPS program, announced on the 8th of July that it has established the “K-Physical AI · AI Convergence Startup Alliance” in collaboration with domestic and international venture capital firms, local governments, and major associations. The goal is to create an investment ecosystem supporting the global expansion of AI convergence and on-device AI startups.   Mr. Cho, CEO of KGround Ventures and organizer of the AI Council, stated: “From the perspective of technological sovereignty, we need sovereign AI. But in order to protect our technological sovereignty and generate real results in the global market, we urgently need a strategy to build value chains through the convergence of deep tech companies—based on Korea's core industries—and AI.”   He emphasized that “This will enable mutual validation of technologies and the creation of viable markets.” He further added, “Deep tech companies with excellent technology and intellectual property (IP) should not be overly reliant on POCs (Proof of Concept) with large corporations. Instead, it is important that they commercialize converged AI technologies and IP applicable across industries within ecosystems developed in collaboration with support agencies and investors.”   Cho concluded that “Korea already leads the world in technology competitiveness in deep tech fields such as semiconductors, manufacturing, defense, bio, and medical. Based on these strengths, we must build an AI convergence startup investment ecosystem centered on support agencies and investors to maximize synergy with sovereign AI.”   Meanwhile, the event held on Friday, July 4 at Changjo Agora featured participation from several next-generation AI technology startups, including HyperVisual AI Inc. (CEO Sam-Yoon Jung), which is developing a GPNPU for on-device AI; Daton Co., Ltd. (CEO Dong-Hyun Kim), which owns a proprietary RBM (Restricted Boltzmann Machine) neural network model and is developing native LLMs and data center AI Ops; THIRA Robotics Co., Ltd. (CEO Dong-Gyong Kim), a company developing autonomous logistics robots; and WIM Inc. (CEO Woo-Jin Jun), a provider of AI control solutions for physical AI. Also in attendance were companies achieving results in AI convergence businesses in the bio, healthcare, and mobility sectors, including Qgenetics Co., Ltd. (CEO Mun-Seog Chang), Nemesis Co., Ltd. (CEO Sung-Ho Wang), and Yellowknife Inc. (CEO Han-Sung Lee).   Notably, THIRA Robotics, HyperVisual AI, and WIM signed an MOU for joint development of next-generation AI logistics robots. They agreed to collaborate on market-driven joint R&D, investment attraction, global IP filings, and marketing through rapid decision-making and feedback processes.   In addition, the launch event for the alliance saw active participation from global experts in AI convergence industries, including: ﾷ Seok-Jin Yoon, former President of the Korea Institute of Science and Technology (KIST) ﾷ In-Suk Han, Head of the K-Bio Lab Hub Project Group ﾷ Jong-Yun Kim, Head of the Venture Growth Center at Incheon Technopark (Incheon TP) ﾷ Young-Chul Yoo, CEO of Kairos Ventures ﾷ Yoon-Chul Lim, CEO of Technovalue ﾷ Dr. Sang-Min Lee of SambaNova, a Silicon Valley-based AI semiconductor company ﾷ Chi-Won Han, CEO of IPS Patent Law Firm   Together, they declared the launch of the “AI Alliance SHIFT”, aiming to create global outcomes in the AI convergence industry, including physical AI. Former KIST President Seok-Jin Yoon, In-Suk Han of the K-Bio Lab Hub, and Nam-Hoon Cho, CEO of K-Ground Ventures, were appointed as co-chairs of the alliance. With the goal of connecting to the Silicon Valley investment ecosystem, they pledged to establish a representative AI consortium for Korea.   Separately, K-Ground Ventures plans to form a global AI IP fund to invest in AI convergence technologies and physical AI companies and intellectual property (IP). In collaboration with global investment firms such as Plug & Play, a renowned Silicon Valley accelerator with an extensive international investment network, they intend to actively build a global ecosystem to nurture AI convergence global enterprises spanning physical AI and bio-healthcare.    정현식 기자investment ecosystem investment ecosystem physical ai ai convergence

2025.07.08. 17:18