Seoul Electronics & Telecom Nominates Former Chairman Yoshimi Takahashi as Inside Director Candidate

Seoul Electronics & Telecom has nominated former SoftBank and SBI Group executive Yoshimi Takahashi as a candidate for inside director.

According to Seoul Electronics & Telecom on October 7, the board of directors resolved the previous day to table the appointment proposals of candidates Takahashi and Seo Sangyun for inside directors as an agenda item for the extraordinary general shareholders’ meeting. The final decision on their appointments will be made at the extraordinary shareholders’ meeting scheduled for October 30, pending shareholder approval.

Candidate Takahashi is a finance and investment expert with extensive experience in both the Korean and Japanese financial markets. He began his career at Nomura Securities in 1988, building his credentials in the Seoul branch’s equity division and Asian equity sales, before moving on to join SoftBank Finance. Since then, he has served as CEO of SoftBank Finance Korea, director and CEO/chairman of Easttrade Korea, CEO of SBI Korea Holdings, and CEO/chairman of SBI Investment Korea, among other positions, leading the finance and investment operations of SoftBank and SBI Group in Korea.

For Seoul Electronics & Telecom, the recruitment of these candidates is not simply about reshuffling the board, but marks a strategic move to expand its mid-to-long-term business portfolio and strengthen its global investment and business network. The company plans to enhance the competitiveness of its existing electronic components business while actively considering entry into the AI data center sector as a new growth engine.

The company’s business expansion strategy is based on “stepwise scaling.” Rather than committing massive investments at the outset, Seoul Electronics & Telecom will first consider a 10–20MW-scale AI data center business model, sequentially securing key prerequisites such as power supply, permits, land, anchor clients, project costs, and financing, before expanding to a 100MW scale.

If Takahashi joins the board, he is expected to leverage his expertise in both the Korean and Japanese financial sectors and wide investment network to support the discovery of strategic investors and business partners, design of project finance (PF) structures, securing overseas investment, and fostering global business collaborations. The other inside director candidate, CEO Seo Sangyun, has been Takahashi’s business partner for many years, and will take on primary responsibility for concretizing and executing new business initiatives.

In addition, Seoul Electronics & Telecom is proceeding with the establishment of a 100% subsidiary tentatively named “SET AI Infrastructure,” which will be dedicated to AI infrastructure businesses. The new subsidiary will function as a platform for the development, investment, and operation of power and computing infrastructure projects centering on AI data centers.

Should individual data center projects scale up in the future, the company plans to establish special purpose companies (SPCs) for each project, forming a business structure of “Seoul Electronics & Telecom → SET AI Infrastructure → project-based AIDC SPCs.” Through this, the company aims to clearly manage the business performance and financing structure of each project, while also laying the groundwork for scaling up multiple AI data center projects.

A company official stated, “Rather than making large-scale investments of 100MW at the beginning, it is our basic principle to first validate business performance and execution feasibility with a 10–20MW model, and then expand in phases. The specifics regarding investment size and business structure will be finalized as conditions for power supply, clients, land, permits, and financing are clarified.”

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