[Edaily Marketin Song Seung-Hyeon Reporter] On the 30th of last month, at the Convention Hall on the 5th floor of Building 38, the Global Engineering Education Center, at Seoul National University’s Gwanak Campus, a doctoral student at the booth of Mobilint, an artificial intelligence (AI) semiconductor startup, asked if he could work at the company as a Special Research Officer. Lee Yoon-seo, Senior HR Manager at Mobilint, replied, “We’ll need to check the specific requirements,” and continued her explanation. The Special Research Officer program is a special military service exemption system that allows individuals subject to active duty or reserve duty to work at research institutions instead of performing military service, with the aim of contributing to the development of national industry and science and technology through academic research and technological innovation.

According to the venture capital (VC) industry on the 6th, FuturePlay—a deep-tech accelerator (AC) and VC—co-hosted the “2026 Seoul National University × FuturePlay Deep Tech Talent Recruitment Fair” with the Seoul National University Startup Support Center on the 30th of last month.

Twelve companies from FuturePlay’s portfolio—including Furiosa AI, Mobilint, Dinotisia, WiRobotics, Lion Robotics, Clero Robotics, Robos, Asteromoph, Navipra, Nanopose AI, GiftShed, and RoAI—participated, opening more than 40 positions for public recruitment.

The event was structured to complete the entire process—from application submission to interviews with hiring managers—in a single day, and approximately 200 Seoul National University undergraduates and graduate students attended. This marks the first time a venture capital firm has partnered with a university to host a recruitment fair for its portfolio companies. According to FuturePlay, some of the interactions at the fair have already led to actual hires. The final number of hires per company is currently being tallied.

Park Won-seon, CEO of Navipra—a manufacturer of autonomous mobile robots (AMRs) for factory automation who attended the job fair—commented on talent recruitment for startups: “I’m not sure if it’s because we need a large number of employees in a short period or due to the declining population, but we are definitely feeling a labor shortage.”

Lee Yun-seo, HR Manager at Mobilint, also noted, “Since we work with edge AI semiconductors, there are job roles that simply don’t exist at large corporations,” adding, “It’s difficult to find where that talent pool is.” While business opportunities are growing thanks to the government’s expanded AI investments, it remains challenging for startups to connect with candidates on their own in a system where talent is concentrated in large corporations.

In Korea’s recruitment landscape, which is centered on open hiring at large corporations, students also lack clear channels to identify promising startups or understand how they conduct hiring.

Park Si-eun (20), an architecture student at Seoul National University, said that before this expo, the only recruitment events she had attended were those featuring major construction conglomerates like Samsung C&T. “Apart from Furiosa AI, these were companies I’d hardly ever heard of before,” Park said. “I hadn’t seen many startups working on physical AI, but coming here helped me realize that a lot of companies actually started out as startups.” Park, who stopped by on a whim after advance registration had closed, said, “If a good opportunity comes up, I’d like to work as an intern at a startup.”

Mr. A, a Ph.D. candidate in the Department of Statistics at Seoul National University, said he visited the event because he was curious about how much companies weigh the balance between theoretical validation and performance. After consulting at the booths, he shared, “I sensed that companies definitely believe people who excel at theoretical validation also excel at research,” adding, “I hadn’t had the chance to learn about this before, but through this book fair, my reservations about startups seem to have lessened.”

Jeon Ik-su (24), a student in the Department of Materials Science and Engineering at Seoul National University, said, “I was once motivated by meeting a CEO who started a company during his sophomore year and recalling a senior from my lab who launched another startup while in graduate school—it made me realize it wasn’t impossible.” He continued, “That motivation had faded over time, but this fair has reopened my mind to the idea of starting a company and hiring at startups.”

Seoul National University has decided to explore making this expo a regular event. FuturePlay plans to make recruitment support for its portfolio companies a regular practice and expand its collaboration to other universities. After jointly operating the “SNU BIG Scale-up” program with Seoul National University’s Startup Support Center last year, FuturePlay invested in MetaFarmers, a company developing agricultural automation robots, and X-Centri. This collaboration, which has long connected university-based tech startups with investment, has now expanded to include talent recruitment.

Kwon Oh-hyung, CEO of FuturePlay, explained, “We have a dedicated talent acquisition (TA) team internally to assist with hiring for our portfolio companies,” adding, “This event is an extension of that effort.” The firm believes that having an investment firm bundle verified companies and connect them with universities—rather than individual startups holding their own information sessions—reduces search costs for both students and companies.

The VC industry also agreed that, given the rapid rise of the AI sector and the resulting boom in domestic startups, there should be more events like this to facilitate talent recruitment. A VC official remarked, “As the startup boom centers on AI and deep tech, securing specialized talent has emerged as a critical factor in a company’s success or failure, but the reality is that startups cannot manage this on their own.” He continued, “Given the prevailing atmosphere within the VC sector to actively provide support, such recruitment fairs appear to be a necessary element for resolving the talent shortage going forward.”