AWS Celebrates 20th Anniversary, Ushering in the Era of Agentic and Physical AI

AWS Summit Seoul 2026 Kicks Off

"Korea Poised to Lead the AI Era with World-Class Network Infrastructure and Industrial Ecosystems"

Amazon Web Services (AWS), the world's largest cloud service provider, marked its 20th anniversary by unveiling its roadmap for agentic artificial intelligence (AI) and physical AI. AI agent services and physical AI applications leveraging AWS services were showcased together at the event.

Ham Kiho, CEO of AWS Korea, delivered the keynote speech at 'AWS Summit Seoul 2026,' held at COEX in Gangnam-gu, Seoul, on the morning of May 20, 2026. He stated, "Generative AI, which emerged only four to five years ago, is now evolving into agentic AI that autonomously makes decisions, AI-driven development (AI DLC) that transforms development methodologies, and physical AI."

Ham Kiho, CEO of AWS Korea, is delivering the keynote speech at 'AWS Summit Seoul 2026' held at COEX, Gangnam-gu, Seoul on the morning of the 19th. Photo by Lee Myunghwan

In his keynote, Ham introduced AWS's use cases supporting customers in this era of agentic AI. He emphasized, "AI is not just a coding tool; through a new development methodology called AI DLC—where humans and AI collaboratively design, develop, and validate software—development and final decision-making are now possible. This will become the new standard for organizations redesigning how they work with AI."

Samsung Electronics was highlighted as a case of agentic AI utilizing AWS services. For Samsung accounts, which serve more than 2.1 billion users worldwide, a self-operating cloud management agent based on Amazon Bedrock Agent Core has been deployed, reducing service recovery time by over 90% and aiming to detect failures within 10 minutes.

Ham also announced AWS's new support program for physical AI, called 'Physical AI Frontier.' He noted, "From data collection to model training and simulation inference, AWS's dedicated teams will provide technical support to connect companies with each other and serve as a bridge for global expansion."

The AWS Summit Seoul, held that day, is considered the largest AI and cloud conference in Korea. Now in its 12th year, the summit is expected to attract more than 25,000 participants. Notably, 2026 marks both the 20th anniversary of AWS's full-fledged cloud service operations and the 10th anniversary of its entry into the Korean market. AWS launched its first storage service, Amazon S3, in 2006 and officially entered Korea by opening the Seoul Region in 2016.

Following Ham's address, John Felton, Chief Financial Officer (CFO) of AWS, remarked, "Korea is one of the most strategically important markets, boasting world-class network infrastructure and a robust industrial ecosystem in semiconductors and manufacturing. The country is well prepared to lead the era of agentic AI."

Jason Bennett, Vice President of AWS Global Startups, introduced new features for the AI-based development tool 'Kiro' and unveiled 'Amazon Transform Custom,' an AI agent that converts code written in legacy programming languages into modern code. Kim Sunghoon, CEO of Upstage, and Kim Hwan, Chief Technology Officer (CTO) of CJ Olive Young, shared service case studies based on AWS.

This year's event centers on the two pillars of agentic AI and physical AI. In addition to the keynote, over 120 sessions and exhibitions will provide participants with insights into AI agents.

AI Diagnoses Skin Tone for Personal Color Analysis... Self-Driving Delivery Robots Featured

AmorePacific's booth at 'AWS Summit Seoul 2026.' Photo by AWS

The expo area at the event allowed attendees to experience customer services powered by AWS's AI offerings.

AmorePacific set up an interactive booth for personalized color analysis. When a participant appeared on a tablet PC at the booth, the AI would recommend suitable cosmetics and skincare solutions based on the user's skin tone and personal color. This service combines AmorePacific's dermatological data with AWS's AI models.

NC AI showcased an AI commerce demo that could generate detailed product pages for fashion items using only photos and voice conversations. When visitors photographed their outfits and explained the brand concept, the AI agent automatically created model shots, product images, and runway videos, providing an initial draft for the product detail page.

Physical AI Zone set up at 'AWS Summit Seoul 2026'. AWS

In the Physical AI Zone, robotic arms and autonomous delivery robots drew attention. Physical AI startup Config demonstrated two collaborative robotic arms sorting recyclable waste—glass bottles, plastics, and aluminum cans—by material. ROAI presented an autonomous production demo where visitors could draw a robot's route, and the robot would follow the path in real time.

At Nuviliti's booth, the self-driving delivery robot 'Newbie Flow' navigated through the event hall, delivering merchandise. During the demonstration, the robot's camera feed was broadcast in real time, and the integrated control system displayed the robot's location and operational status on screen.

A special booth commemorating AWS's 20th anniversary was also set up. Here, AI-driven solutions for industrial applications were exhibited in spaces such as 'AWS for Industry' and the Physical AI Lounge. In the Kiro Zone, a developer experience area, participants could try programming a character to move using only voice commands.

On the morning of the 19th, an installation commemorating AWS's 20th anniversary was exhibited at the COEX event hall in Gangnam-gu, Seoul, where the 'AWS Summit Seoul 2026' is being held. Photo by Lee Myunghwan

This content was produced with the assistance of AI translation services.