The KT-KISDI International Conference 2021 will be held on December 14. 

▶ Online/Offline event on the main theme of ‘Digital transformation and AI ecosystems for the future ecosystem’.
▶ Presentations by sixteen speakers from South Korea, Germany, France, Canada, KT, KISDI and follow-up discussions.
▶ Future industrial outlook including the smart city, manufacturing, healthcare, cluster formation, and a discussion about how to realize the future outlook
▶ “Business ideas for the future can be derived from the experiences and policy examples of numerous companies.”

KISDI (President Kwon Ho-yeol) and KT (www.kt.com, CEO Ku Hyun-Mo) hosted the KT-KISDI International Conference 2021 on the theme of “Digital Transformation & the AI Ecosystem for Future Industries” at the Ruby Hall of the Shilla Hotel on December 14, 2021.

At the opening ceremony before the start of the main session, President Park Jong-wook of KT delivered the opening address. He said, “This international conference is a forum organized jointly with KISDI to gather the wisdom of experts from all industrial sectors in South Korea and abroad with regard to the global challenge of growing their digital economies. I hope that many of the attendees will gain some inspiration for new business ideas by absorbing the experiences of and lessons learned by the companies introduced at this conference.”

In his welcoming address, Director Kwon Ho-yeol of KISDI said, “I hope that the conference will provide an opportunity to think about and contemplate answers to a vision of the future in which industries are driven by digital transformation and AI ecosystems, and where changes are superseded by innovation and evolution.” The closing ceremony was completed with an address by Park Yoon-gyu, the Director of Information and Communication Policy at the Ministry of Science and ICT.

Director Hur Seok-joon of the KT Economics & Management Research Institute was the first speaker of session 1, which was dedicated to the topic of digital transformation. In a presentation titled ‘KT’s Digiko Strategy for Digital Korea’, Director Hur talked about the strategies employed by KT to transform itself into a digital company and gave numerous examples of services that use AI, Big Data, Cloud, and robot technologies. Director Hur said, “As all sectors of society are becoming digitalized due to COVID-19, digital transformation and the establishment of AI ecosystems have become both critical factors for the survival and growth of companies, and dominant issues that are shaping the development of industries and countries. As a reliable DX partner of digital Korea, we at DIGICO KT are ready to lend our assistance in making the digital ecosystem of South Korea more robust and in ensuring that all companies from conglomerates to small enterprises receive the benefits of the digital era.”

The second presentation was given by Florian Kirchbuchner from Fraunhofer IGD, who leads the company’s smart living/biometric technology team. He said, “In order to build a smart city, a system of systems is needed that links up legacy systems and utilizes data effectively. He introduced the audience to various projects launched by the German state of Hessen in the city of Darmstadt, including an e-highway that automatically charges electric trucks that travel on the highway, and a simulation program that enables ordinary citizens to participate in urban planning through their smartphones.

The third presentation was given by CEO Oh Byung-joon of Siemens Digital Industry SW Korea. He talked about the Siemens factory in Amberg, Germany a global benchmark in smart factories. He explained how the new concept of smart factory uses digital twin technology to create a virtual factory that exchanges real-time data with a real factory, thereby optimizing the latter’s operation.

The presentations in session 1 were followed by a debate moderated by Professor Lim Kyu-gun from the Department of Management of Hanyang University. Professor Lee Jeong-hoon of Yonsei University, Yeom Sun-ho from the Strategy Support Division of Korea Management Certification, Silvia Rus from the Fraunhofer Research Institute in Germany, CEO Oh Byung-joon of Siemens Digital Industry, and Director Huh Seok-joon of the KT Economics & Management Research Institute all participated in the debate, giving their thoughts on the role of government, companies, and academia in ensuring a successful digital transformation and how citizens must also change and adapt to the new era.

In the second session, three people gave presentations on the AI ecosystem. First, Research Fellow Kim Kyung-hoon gave his diagnosis of the current state of South Korea’s AI ecosystem (AI adoption status for each industry) and presented his selection of policy tasks that must be tackled to ensure the successful adoption and spread of AI in various industries.

Baptiste Perrin of GE Healthcare, the second speaker in the second session, talked about public-private sector collaborations in France’s AI medical sector, focusing on two examples: HECAM (a liver cancer early detection project) and AI DReAM (a medical imaging technology precision enhancement project). He emphasized the fact that both projects are funded by the French government (BPI France) and operated as a consortium type of collaboration model in which the participants are AI startups, public hospitals, and research institutes.

The final and third speaker was CEO Julien Billot of Canada’s Scale AI. He introduced Scale AI as a supercluster company whose goal is to commercialize all lab-developed AI technologies so that they can be used at manufacturing sites and transform Canada into a hub of knowledge businesses. In addition, he said the company is providing financial support and operating various programs for developing the human resources needed by research institutes and companies that are commercializing AI technology for all stages of manufacturing (demand forecasting, price determination, logistics, and inventory management), and went on to emphasize that the company has received funding of $283 million from the Canadian federal government and Quebec Province.

The follow-up debate after session 2 was moderated by Professor Park Min-soo from the Department of Economics of Sungkyunkwan University. The panelists in the debate included CEO Yoon Myung-chul of ZENA, Director Song Ho-cheol of DOUZONE BIZON, Professor Chang Byung-tak from Seoul National University’s Department of Computer Engineering, Baptiste Perrin of GE Healthcare, and Research Fellow Kim Kyung-hoon of KISDI. The debate focused on which was the greatest hurdle to the advancement of the AI ecosystem and what actions should be taken to overcome it.

We are now standing at a crossroads in digital transformation. This conference presented an opportune moment for figures from industry, academia, research institutes, and the government to take a close look at the future of the industry together and seeks ways of acquiring global competitiveness. As the hosts of this event, KISDI and KT agreed to work together in the future to promote the digital transformation of domestic industries and strengthen the AI ecosystem, which has now entered the growth stage.