New Icheon Forum set for June 11-13; SK merges two flagship events into single annual gathering; Chey met Nvidia and TSMC chiefs in rapid succession to cement AI alliances; forum expected to map out next steps in elevated Nvidia partnership; rebalancing nears completion as focus shifts to AI expansion; surging advanced semiconductor demand prompts reassessment of key assets

SK Group Chairman Chey Tae-won delivers remarks at the Entrepreneurship Round Table Members Day event held at the Korea Chamber of Commerce and Industry in Jung-gu, Seoul, on May 20. [Yonhap]
SK Group Chairman Chey Tae-won delivers remarks at the Entrepreneurship Round Table Members Day event held at the Korea Chamber of Commerce and Industry in Jung-gu, Seoul, on May 20. [Yonhap]

SK Group Chairman Chey Tae-won is expected to lay out a new AI-centered blueprint for the conglomerate at the inaugural "New Icheon Forum" this week, following a series of high-profile meetings with global tech leaders. With the group's intensive rebalancing drive — a sweeping restructuring of its business portfolio — nearing completion, a shift in SK's broader management strategy is drawing close attention.

'SK's Davos' turns 10 — and gets an upgrade

SK Group will hold the New Icheon Forum from Thursday through Saturday at the SKMS Research Institute in Icheon, Gyeonggi Province, according to industry sources Monday. The event merges two previously separate gatherings — the semiannual management strategy conference, held each June, and the Icheon Forum, the group's flagship knowledge-management platform held each August — into a single, elevated occasion. Now in its 10th edition, the Icheon Forum was launched in 2017 at Chey's initiative and has served as SK's answer to the World Economic Forum in Davos, bringing together global scholars and experts to debate emerging technologies and future business directions.

The decision to combine the two major group events reflects SK's view that speed is paramount in the global AI race. The merger is intended to sharpen the efficiency of discussions that had been spread across two separate forums and to maximize execution in a rapidly shifting industry landscape. SK Group plans to hold the New Icheon Forum every June going forward.

The forum will draw Chey alongside the chief executives of key affiliates including SK Hynix, SK Telecom and SK Innovation, and AI acceleration will be by far the dominant theme. "AI and AX — AI transformation — will be the biggest topics at the forum," a company official said, adding that sessions rooted in SK's proprietary management philosophy, SKMS, will give business units across member companies a structured space to discuss improvement and synergy.

Chey and Jensen Huang met five times in a single week

The forum carries particular weight because it opens immediately after Chey completed an intensive round of face-to-face meetings with the central players in the global AI semiconductor market, generating heightened anticipation both inside and outside the company.

Chey attended Computex 2026 in Taiwan earlier this month, where he met Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang and TSMC Chairman Wei Che-chia, among other heavyweights in AI and semiconductors, to advance cooperation on strengthening the AI chip ecosystem. His engagement with Huang was especially intense: after two separate meetings at Computex, the two reconvened in Korea — over a samgyeopsal dinner on Friday, a "chimaek" (fried chicken and beer) outing on Sunday, and a joint announcement Monday on plans to expand AI infrastructure cooperation.

At the Sunday evening gathering in Gangnam, Seoul — billed as a second informal "gganbu" meeting between the two — Huang publicly shouted "More HBM!" in front of onlookers, formally signaling that demand for SK Hynix's high-bandwidth memory products remains strong.

Chey's AI diplomacy extends to Japan as well. He is scheduled to attend the 31st Nikkei Forum in Tokyo from Tuesday through Thursday, where observers will watch closely for any messages he may deliver on AI cooperation with Japanese partners.

Chey has been emphasizing an "AI total solution" approach across the AI value chain and pushing to build partnerships on all fronts. The forum is expected to produce more concrete plans for inter-affiliate synergies aimed at realizing that strategy.

Rebalancing winds down — is an 'AI expansion' era next?

There is also growing speculation that SK could use the New Icheon Forum to signal a broader shift in management strategy. For the past several years, the group has been consumed by a rebalancing effort to streamline its sprawling affiliate network and restructure around AI. Industry watchers say that work has largely found its footing and is entering a closing phase, opening the door for messaging that moves away from contraction and toward aggressive AI competitiveness.

Signs of that shift are already visible in how the group is handling asset sales and liquidity moves. The prolonged negotiations between SK Group and Doosan Group over the sale of SK Siltron are a case in point. The divestiture was originally pursued as part of the rebalancing, but the strategic calculus has changed significantly: surging global AI demand has driven explosive appetite for advanced semiconductors, sharply elevating the value of semiconductor wafers as a critical material. With the AI semiconductor value chain now far more central to the group than it once was, analysts say SK is reassessing the asset's worth and proceeding with greater caution on any sale or negotiation strategy.


keg@heraldcorp.com