Third WorldSkills appearance in cloud computing

First silver medal in 2024; also served as chief judge at Asian competition

Bae Ju-hyeok, a technology lead on LG Uplus's UCube DAX team, will serve as an international expert delegate for the cloud computing category at the 48th WorldSkills Competition in Shanghai, China. [LG Uplus]
Bae Ju-hyeok, a technology lead on LG Uplus's UCube DAX team, will serve as an international expert delegate for the cloud computing category at the 48th WorldSkills Competition in Shanghai, China. [LG Uplus]

Bae Ju-hyeok, a technology lead at LG Uplus, will participate in his third international WorldSkills Competition as director of South Korea's national cloud computing team.

LG Uplus said Thursday that Bae, a member of its UCube DAX team, will serve as an international expert delegate for the cloud computing category at the 48th WorldSkills Competition, which opens in Shanghai, China, on Monday.

Held every two years, WorldSkills is the world's largest skills competition. This year's event runs from Monday through Saturday at the National Exhibition and Convention Center in Shanghai, drawing about 1,400 participants — including competitors and expert delegates — from more than 70 countries and regions, who will compete across 64 categories spanning information and communications technology, manufacturing and construction.

The cloud computing category tests contestants' ability to design, build and operate IT infrastructure in a cloud environment within a set time limit. It was added as an official WorldSkills category in 2019, reflecting the growing adoption of cloud technology across industries and the rising demand for skilled professionals in the field.

Competitors represent their countries over four days of competition, completing a different task each day, with final standings determined by judging results. Seventeen countries will compete this year, including South Korea, China, Japan, Canada, Brazil, Australia, Switzerland and South Africa.

Bae has served as director of South Korea's cloud computing national team at every WorldSkills Competition since 2022. He contributed to the team's first-ever silver medal in the cloud computing category at the 2024 competition in Lyon, France.

At last year's WorldSkills Asia competition, he became the first South Korean to serve as chief judge for the cloud computing category — the top official responsible for designing the competition format and overseeing all aspects of the event.

South Korea has won the overall championship 19 times since first competing at WorldSkills in 1967. At the 2024 Lyon competition, it finished second overall behind China, and the team is now aiming for a 20th overall title in Shanghai.

"WorldSkills is a stage where young skilled talents from around the world compete," Bae said. "I will do my best to help South Korean competitors perform at their highest level and to showcase the competitiveness of Korea's cloud technology to the world."

Meanwhile, LG Uplus last month registered Amazon Web Services' cloud infrastructure-as-a-service brokerage on the government's Digital Service Procurement Support System. The company plans to combine AWS's cloud infrastructure with its own network and security operations capabilities to support public institutions in adopting and managing cloud services.


woo@heraldcorp.com