[Edaily Reporter Lee So-hyun] #SK Telecom held a technical seminar to share the cutting-edge research it has accumulated during the development of its proprietary artificial intelligence (AI) foundation model with students and developers.

SKT announced on the 18th that it had held a seminar to engage with students and developers interested in its proprietary AI foundation model.

At the first seminar, held on the 17th at SKT’s headquarters in Jung-gu, Seoul, Professor Seo In-seok of Seoul National University’s Department of Mathematical Sciences delivered a presentation titled “Mathematical Artificial Intelligence: The Difference Between Plausibility and Correctness.” Focusing on the question “How does AI think?”, Professor Seo explained, from a mathematician’s perspective, what kind of mathematics AI employs and how large language models (LLMs) learn mathematics.

Approximately 200 AI professionals, including developers, students, and employees of SK Group companies, attended the seminar. Following the presentation, attendees engaged in a question-and-answer session and discussion regarding the mathematical principles and reasoning methods of AI.

This seminar was organized to share with the public the trends in AI technology that SKT’s elite team has been researching while carrying out the government’s independent AI foundation model project. The seminar series, consisting of three sessions, is themed “How AI Thinks, Acts, and Evolves into an Industrial System.”

SKT explained that its goal is to provide an accessible explanation of the academic foundation—specifically, the pioneering research on which its elite team is basing its model development—in a way that anyone can understand.

Representing the research team from SKT’s elite unit responsible for the preliminary research, professors from Seoul National University are serving as speakers. At the first seminar on the 17th, Professor Seo explained the principles of AI from a mathematical perspective. On the 23rd, Professor Yoo Young-jae from Seoul National University’s Department of Computer Science and Engineering will deliver a lecture on AI inference methods. On the 1st of next month, Professor Yoon Seong-ro from Seoul National University’s Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering will present on the AI model ecosystem.

Each lecture is also significant from the perspective of developing SKT’s proprietary AI model, “A.X K2.” Professor Seo’s lecture addressed how AI acquires reasoning capabilities. Professor Yoo’s lecture will explain the foundation of the multimodal capabilities pursued by SKT’s elite team. Professor Yoon’s lecture is scheduled to cover how developed AI models can be integrated into and contribute to industry.

The seminar will also be available via live online streaming on the day of the event. Those wishing to watch the online broadcast can register through the A.X LinkedIn page.

SK Telecom’s elite team plans to pursue industry-academia collaboration at the consortium level to ensure that A.X K2 is equipped with agent capabilities—such as solving math problems and coding—and achieves performance suitable for model deployment and industrial expansion.

Kim Tae-yoon, Head of Foundation Models at SKT, said, “The purpose of this seminar is to clearly explain the technical background behind model training so that anyone can understand and appreciate what capabilities a proprietary foundation model should possess.”