Server room inside a national AI data center (Photo courtesy of NHN)
SEOUL, Aug. 25 (Korea Bizwire) — South Korea will more than quadruple the capacity of its national backbone network — the core infrastructure of the country’s telecommunications system — by 2030 to handle an expected surge in traffic from artificial intelligence technologies, the government announced Sunday.
The Ministry of Science and ICT said it plans to expand backbone bandwidth from 2.4 terabits per second (Tbps) today to 10 Tbps within five years. A backbone network is often likened to an expressway, carrying the heaviest flows of data traffic across the country. At 1 Tbps, 32 high-definition films can be transmitted in a single second.
Officials project that data traffic could climb to as much as nine times 2023 levels by 2033 as AI adoption accelerates from large language models to “physical AI” applications such as robotics and autonomous vehicles.
The ministry will release a national network modernization strategy in September, outlining both capacity expansion and domestic innovation in network technologies.
A central goal is to reduce reliance on scarce and costly computing resources such as GPUs. By upgrading network efficiency, South Korea hopes to ease the burden of AI development and close the gap with foreign technology giants that command vast computing power.
The government also aims to localize network technologies linking and operating AI data centers, amid intensifying global competition. China, for example, is advancing autonomous AI-driven networks that optimize efficiency without human intervention.
“Data traffic will only increase as AI becomes part of everyday life and industry,” said an industry official. “We need to accelerate the expansion and sophistication of next-generation network infrastructure.”
Kevin Lee (kevinlee@koreabizwire.com)
