South Korea’s Samsung Electronics (OTCPK:SSNLF) and SK hynix (OTCPK:HXSCF) are joining OpenAI’s Stargate initiative to advance global AI infrastructure.
Microsoft (NASDAQ:MSFT)-backed OpenAI said these partnerships will focus on increasing the supply of advanced memory chips essential for next-generation AI and expanding data center capacity in Korea, positioning Samsung and SK as key contributors to global AI infrastructure and supporting Korea’s ambition to become a top-three global AI nation.
The announcement followed a meeting between South Korean President Lee Jae-myung, Samsung’s Executive Chairman Jay Lee, SK Chairman Chey Tae-won, and OpenAI’s CEO Sam Altman at the Presidential Office in Seoul.
Under the partnerships, Samsung and SK plan to scale up production of advanced memory chips, targeting 900,000 DRAM wafer starts per month at an accelerated capacity rollout, critical for powering OpenAI’s advanced AI models, according to the AI startup.
OpenAI said the agreements also include a separate partnership with SK Telecom to explore building an AI data center in Korea.
“Partnering on Stargate represents a landmark moment for SK and the official starting point for comprehensive technological innovation, with SK bringing powerful synergies across the full AI stack—memory semiconductors, data centers, energy, and networks,” said SK Chairman Chey Tae-won.
OpenAI also inked agreements with Samsung C&T and Samsung Heavy Industries, and Samsung SDS to assess opportunities for additional data center capacity in the country.
Samsung SDS entered a potential partnership with OpenAI to jointly develop AI data centers and provide enterprise AI services. Samsung SDS also signed a reseller partnership for OpenAI’s services in Korea and plans to support local companies in adopting OpenAI’s ChatGPT Enterprise offerings.
Samsung C&T and Samsung Heavy Industries will team up with OpenAI to advance global AI data centers, with a particular focus on the joint development of floating data centers.
Samsung noted that floating data centers are considered to have advantages over data centers because they can address land scarcity, lower cooling costs, and reduce carbon emissions, but technical complexity has so far limited wider deployment.
The South Korean company added that it will also explore opportunities to pursue projects in floating power plants and control centers, in addition to floating data center infrastructure.
In addition, Samsung and SK will also look to deploy ChatGPT Enterprise and API capabilities into their operations to improve workflows.
OpenAI also signed agreements to explore developing next-generation AI data centers in Korea. These include a memorandum of understanding, or MoU, with the Korean Ministry of Science and ICT, or MSIT, specifically to evaluate opportunities for building AI data centers outside the Seoul Metropolitan Area to support balanced regional economic growth and job creation across the country.
Stargate, a massive $500B joint venture project, already includes big names from the industry, such as Nvidia (NASDAQ:NVDA) and Oracle (NYSE:ORCL) and SoftBank Group (OTCPK:SFTBY) (OTCPK:SFTBF).
SK hynix is a major supplier of High-Bandwidth Memory, or HBM chips to Nvidia.
Last month, Stargate revealed the inner workings of its first large-scale data center, located in Abilene, Texas. The project eventually plans to build two more data centers in Texas, one in New Mexico, one in Ohio and another in a Midwest location.
In August, SoftBank Group said it was taking longer than expected to get the Stargate project off the ground.