Sunghee Yun (He/Him)

Co-Founder & CTO @ Erudio Bio, Inc., Co-Founder & Leader & Chair of Silicon Valley AI Nexus (AI Nexus), Advisor @ Korean American Semiconductor Professional Alliance (KASPA), CGO / Global Managing Partner @ LULUMEDIC, KFAS-Salzburg Global Leadership Initiative Fellow @ Salzburg Global Seminar, AI-Korean Medicine Integration Initiative Task Force Member @ The Association of Korean Medicine, Director of AI Semiconductor @ K-BioX, Visiting Professor @ Sogang University, Advisory Professor @ DGIST, Global Advisory Board Member @ Innovative Future Brain-Inspired Intelligence System Semiconductor of Sogang University, and Network Expert @ Gerson Lehrman Group

Abstract

While much of the public discourse around Artificial Intelligence (AI) remains fixated on large language models (LLMs) and chatbots, a quieter but arguably more consequential revolution is unfolding in vertical domains where AI meets the physical world. From predictive process control in semiconductor manufacturing to AI-driven drug discovery and multi-omics cancer diagnostics, domain-specific AI systems are beginning to deliver transformative impact that general-purpose models alone cannot achieve. This talk argues that we are at a critical inflection point: the convergence of maturing AI capabilities — agentic architectures, foundation models, and advanced optimization — with deep domain expertise is unlocking unprecedented opportunities in manufacturing, biotechnology, and medicine.

Drawing on over two decades of firsthand experience building AI systems across radically different verticals, the speaker traces a practitioner’s journey from twelve years of semiconductor design and process optimization at Samsung, through co-founding Gauss Labs as SK Group’s industrial AI venture, to establishing Erudio Bio, a Gates Foundation-backed startup developing the Versatile Smart Assay (VSA) platform for cancer biomarker diagnostics and the bioTCAD platform for AI-driven drug discovery. Each transition revealed a recurring pattern: the highest-impact AI applications emerge not from algorithmic novelty alone, but from the disciplined marriage of mathematical foundations — particularly Convex Optimization — with intimate knowledge of the target domain’s constraints, data structures, and decision workflows.

Looking ahead, the talk examines how agentic AI, physical AI, and bio-AI convergence will reshape vertical industries over the next decade, and what strategic choices researchers, entrepreneurs, and policymakers must make to capture this moment. Special attention is given to the unique challenges and opportunities in bridging Silicon Valley’s AI ecosystem with Korea’s strengths in semiconductor manufacturing, clinical infrastructure, and biotech talent — a nexus that may well define the next era of global AI competitiveness.