[Edaily Reporter Shin Yeong-bin ] A total of 958 teams from 55 countries around the world took part in a competition to solve complex production problems at shipyards using mathematics. Hosted by LG CNS, this mathematical optimization competition expanded in scale this year to become an international event, with the number of participating teams increasing by approximately 2.8 times compared to last year.

LG CNS (#LGCNES) announced on the 20th that it had concluded the “Optimization Grand Challenge 2026,” co-hosted with the Korean Institute of Industrial Engineers, and held an awards ceremony.

Mathematical optimization is a technique that calculates countless possibilities within given resources and conditions to find the most efficient solution. It is applied in industrial settings requiring complex decision-making, such as production planning, logistics, robot path planning, and facility operations. LG Corp. has been holding this annual competition since 2024 to expand the adoption of related technologies.

This year’s competition attracted 958 teams and 1,448 participants from 55 countries, including the United States, the United Kingdom, China, Japan, Germany, and India. Compared to last year, the number of participating teams increased by approximately 2.8 times, and the number of participants more than doubled.

Participants included students from overseas universities such as Carnegie Mellon University, Imperial College London, Stanford University, and the University of Tokyo, as well as domestic universities including Seoul National University, KAIST, and POSTECH. Current professionals from companies such as Accenture, IBM, SamsungElectronics, and HyundaiMotor also competed.

This year’s challenge focused on “block placement optimization” in shipyards. Ultra-large vessels are constructed by first manufacturing several large structural units—known as blocks—and then assembling them. Participants designed algorithms to determine where, in what orientation, and when to place blocks of varying sizes and shapes within a limited workspace.

Since this problem requires simultaneously considering multiple conditions—such as the work sequence for each block, delivery deadlines, and workspace area—it is considered one of the most challenging problems in the shipbuilding industry. The competition proceeded such that when a participating team submitted an algorithm, the scoring system calculated its performance and displayed the results on a real-time leaderboard.

The top six teams that advanced through the preliminary and semifinal rounds presented their algorithm performance and design rationale at the finals held in South Korea.

The Daesang was awarded to a team from Japan. LG Corp. awarded a total of 200 million won in prize money to 20 teams, including the Daesang winner, and will offer recruitment-linked internships or exemption from the document screening stage for job applications based on their rankings.

The algorithm code submitted by the top 10 teams will be released as open source. This is to enable academia and industry to utilize a variety of problem-solving approaches.

LG Corp. has carried out over 200 projects utilizing mathematical optimization across various industries, including shipbuilding, defense, steel, logistics, manufacturing, finance, and aviation. Recently, the company has undertaken projects to optimize material loading and crane operation schedules for steelmakers, the movement and charging routes of airport robots, and painting work plans for shipbuilders.

The company explained that for a major domestic manufacturer, applying mathematical optimization to production plans for indoor and outdoor air conditioning units reduced inventory passing through logistics warehouses by 57%.

Park Sang-kyun, Executive Vice President and Head of the Entru Division at LG CNS, stated, “Achieving maximum efficiency with limited resources is a complex and difficult task, but it can be solved through mathematical optimization,” adding, “We will continue to grow this competition and expand the horizons of optimization technology together with talented individuals from around the world.”