[Why&Next]Naver to Build a Korean Defense AI Platform

Naver Cloud Establishes Dedicated Defense AI Organization
Active Use of Proprietary Technologies and Infrastructure
Pioneering New Markets in Defense and Public Sectors

Naver has established a dedicated Defense Artificial Intelligence (AI) organization and is pioneering the defense and public sectors. Taking into account the unique characteristics of the defense field, where security is the top priority, the company aims to create a new market by integrating AI with defense through solutions based on Naver's proprietary AI technologies and infrastructure.

On June 1, Naver Cloud, a subsidiary of NAVER, launched its dedicated defense AI organization, "Defense Frontier." This is the first time Naver has created an AI team solely responsible for defense projects. The new organization is overseen by Yuwon Kim, CEO of Naver Cloud. The company has fully deployed Field Deployment Engineers (FDEs) who are directly involved on-site to design and implement customized AI solutions.

As global competition in AI technology increasingly expands into the security sector, achieving technological independence and securing data sovereignty have become more important than ever. Naver sees the defense platform as a potential stepping stone for building a sovereign AI platform, which prompted the creation of this new defense organization.

The defense sector possesses a vast amount of sensitive materials, such as military secrets and national security data, making it difficult to rely on global big tech AI solutions. This is due to restrictions on using foreign cloud services and the challenges of transferring data abroad. In addition, the unique requirements of the security sector have increased the need for independent AI services and infrastructure that do not depend on foreign AI models or infrastructure, making this a market with high future growth potential.

Yuwon Kim, CEO of Naver Cloud.

In particular, Naver has strengths in collaboration thanks to its extensive experience processing large-scale data through search, advertising, and commerce operations, and its strong push for sovereign AI. Defense AI requires infrastructure such as GPU servers, data centers, secure cloud environments, and AI models. With proprietary data centers and HyperCLOVA X, Naver is well-positioned to create synergies. By breaking into the defense sector, which has high entry barriers within the public market, Naver can also lay the groundwork for expanding into other sectors with strict security requirements, such as finance, manufacturing, and public institutions.

Naver Cloud plans to develop and commercialize AI models tailored for defense, creating solutions that address the specific needs of the sector. The company is also detailing plans to apply "omnimodal" AI technology, which combines and analyzes multiple forms of data—such as text, images, and audio—to reason and generate outputs. If implemented, this technology could be used for drone video analysis, intrusion detection, and voice-command tactical support, among other applications. By building defense-specific AI systems for analyzing drone, satellite, and operational data tailored to the military environment, Naver aims to take the lead in the defense AI and cloud market. The company also plans to expand its sovereign AI platform by establishing an integrated defense platform that brings together Naver’s AI models, cloud data platforms, and field engineers.

A Naver Cloud representative stated, "With the launch of a dedicated defense AI organization, we are reorganizing our structure," adding, "The defense sector itself is a large and highly promising market, and we plan to provide AI solutions tailored to the defense and security environment by leveraging our proprietary cloud infrastructure and sovereign AI capabilities."

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