Shinsegae chairman attends U.S. AI, semiconductor Foundry School launch

Shinsegae Group Chairman Chung Yong-jin attended the launch of the U.S. State Department's Foundry School in Washington on Thursday, placing a Korean retail chairman in a room otherwise filled with semiconductor and AI executives.

The event was held at the Donald J. Trump Institute of Peace, formerly the United States Institute of Peace. Shinsegae said Chung attended at the invitation of U.S. Vice President JD Vance and the State Department.

Foundry School is a work force program run by the State Department with Stanford University. It is anchored in an advanced manufacturing curriculum developed by Stanford, with keystone lectures from seven partner universities, and will run 17 sessions across eight campuses across the states, taught by founders and chief executives from manufacturing firms.

Reflection AI CEO Misha Laskin spoke on a panel and singled out Chung, according to Shinsegae Group. The two companies signed a memorandum of understanding in San Francisco in March to build a 250-megawatt data center in Korea.

Laskin said that the cooperation with Shinsegae under Chairman Chung's leadership shows a solid Korea-U.S. partnership and is a good example of how the United States and its allies can actually move together.

Chung responded that successfully leading an advanced industrial supply chain alliance centered on the United States is the task of our time.

"American manufacturers will need an estimated 3.8 million skilled workers by 2033 in semiconductors, defense, energy, and beyond," said the U.S. State Department in a fact sheet released on Thursday. "The State Department, working with Congress, plans to support the participation of Pax Silica economies in Foundry School and is working with Stanford University to develop the curriculum for U.S. and foreign participants."

The program sits under Pax Silica, the State Department initiative launched in December 2025 to align AI and technology supply chains among allied economies. Korea was among the original signatories; the group had 24 members as of the second summit in June 2026.

Vance and Secretary of State Marco Rubio spoke at the launch. Also present were House Majority Leader Steve Scalise, Under Secretary of State for Economic Affairs Jacob Helberg, Meta President and Vice Chairman Dina Powell McCormick, Micron Technology CEO Sanjay Mehrotra and Applied Materials CEO Gary Dickerson.

"This is a project that will involve sustainment for the long term," said Rubio. Multiple American administrations are going to have to make this a priority, which is why it’s so important that you see evidence that, at the highest levels of our government, now and for the future, you have that commitment."

"If you think of the thrust of college education over the last 20, 30 years was if you want to make a lot of money, if you want to have a good career, go into law, go into finance, go into banking, that was it," said Vance. "I think what we're doing with the Foundry is we're telling America's next generation of entrepreneurs and engineers and just brilliant kids that there is a future, both a financial future but also a future in the dignity of what you're going to be doing every single day, by actually building things."

BY KIM MIN-YOUNG [[email protected]]