▲ AI PRISM* Personalized Economic Briefing
* Editor's note: AI PRISM (Personalized Report & Insight Summarizing Media) is an AI-based personalized news recommendation and summary service developed with support from the Korea Press Foundation. It selects and delivers six tailored news items for each reader type.
[Key Issue Briefing]
■ Venture Arm Launch: SK hynix (000660.KS) has launched a corporate venture capital brand called SK hynix Ventures in Silicon Valley and is broadening its investment scope across the AI ecosystem. Moving beyond its previous focus on semiconductors and future technologies, the company will seek out promising firms across AI infrastructure, including AI computing, data centers, system software and optical interconnects. Cumulative returns from its CVC activity, which dates back to 2015, already exceed twice the amount invested.
■ Open-Source Release: Zenon, a generative AI solutions company, has open-sourced Hunmin VLM 397B, an AI model that recognizes and directly operates computer screens. Rather than simply answering questions, the model locates buttons and input fields on a screen and carries out actual tasks. In a demanding screen-recognition benchmark, it outperformed both its base model and models specialized in screen operation, and was the only model from a Korean company to rank near the top.
■ Deregulation: The U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission has sharply eased rules on tokenized stocks, which allow listed shares to be traded in the form of digital assets. The temporary stopgap measure came two days after the failure of the CLARITY Act, which would have defined the legal character of digital assets. The change is expected to open the way for U.S. stocks to be traded in small fractions around the clock, and shares of related companies jumped immediately after the announcement.
[News of Interest to Startup Founders]
1. SK hynix Launches 'SK hynix Ventures' in Silicon Valley
- Key points: SK hynix has launched a corporate venture capital brand, SK hynix Ventures, in Silicon Valley and is expanding its investment scope across the AI ecosystem. The first SK hynix Ventures Day, held on the 17th, drew senior executives including CEO and President Kwak Noh-jung, along with global venture capital firms and startup representatives. Through its Americas unit, SKHYA, the company has invested directly in semiconductor and future-technology startups in the United States, China, Israel and Japan since 2015, or committed capital to venture funds, and cumulative returns have surpassed twice the amount invested. "Competitiveness in the AI era comes not only from securing innovative technology quickly, but also from ecosystem capabilities in which customers, partners and startups create new value together," Kwak said.
2. Zenon Open-Sources Computer-Operating AI Model 'Hunmin VLM 397B'
- Key points: Zenon, a generative AI solutions company, has open-sourced Hunmin VLM 397B, an AI model that recognizes computer screens and operates them directly to perform tasks. The model is built on Qwen 3.5-397B, an open model with 397 billion parameters, with enhanced computer-operating capabilities. It scored 75.6 for accuracy on ScreenSpot Pro, a demanding screen-recognition benchmark, placing second on Hugging Face's official leaderboard, and scored 70.5 on OSWorld, a Linux-environment benchmark, 22.3 points higher than the base model. "This is the result of strengthening computer-operating capabilities with limited computing resources while maintaining existing Korean-language performance," said Myung Dae-woo, Zenon's chief technology officer and vice president.
3. Two Days After CLARITY Act Collapse, U.S. SEC Eases Rules on Tokenized Stocks
- Key points: The U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission has sharply eased rules on tokenized stocks, allowing listed shares to be bought and sold in the form of digital assets. Token stock venues that meet certain conditions will be exempted for five years from rules previously applied on the same terms as conventional securities exchanges, and only tokenized stocks carrying the same shareholder rights as ordinary shares, such as dividends and voting rights, are covered. Industry watchers expect Coinbase and Robinhood to qualify for the exemption by taking on liquidity provider status. Shares of Securitize, a tokenization specialist, surged as much as 22% intraday before closing up 15% following the move, while Coinbase and Robinhood each rose more than 5%.
4. "OpenAI Stole 10 Million Articles to Develop ChatGPT"
- Key points: OpenAI trained its models on more than 10 million news articles without permission, and court documents indicate the company was aware the practice could threaten the survival of news organizations. About one-third of the articles used without authorization came from The New York Times, and the documents include an exchange in which Greg Brockman, OpenAI co-founder and president, responded favorably after a researcher described a way to bypass paywalls. Brent Hecht, director of applied science at Microsoft, characterized the case as a striking theft on an unprecedented scale when the Times sued OpenAI and Microsoft in 2023. OpenAI and Microsoft argue that their use of news content qualifies as fair use, and the U.S. Justice Department filed a brief with the court earlier this month siding with the companies.
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