Huh Tae-soo: "Field ideas meet AI to transform safety management" ... GS Group Hackathon honors "AIR"

[Financial News] Huh Tae-soo, chairman of GS Group, highlighted how an artificial intelligence (AI) service originating from frontline employees' ideas has spread across industrial workplaces, lending momentum to a field-oriented AI transformation (AX). AIR, a safety-management AI agent that began at the GS Group Hackathon held in 2024, has expanded to about 330 sites, including those operated by small and medium-sized enterprises. At this year's hackathon, GS Group plans to accelerate the development of industry-specific AI by using AI-ready data.
GS Group announced on the 21st that it had hosted the 5th GS Group Hackathon at The Westin Seoul Parnas in Gangnam-gu, Seoul. Running through the 22nd, the hackathon drew a record 923 participants, including 797 employees from GS affiliates and 126 external participants.
Huh Tae-soo presented the Open Innovation Award to the AIR team. The award recognized the achievement of an employee's idea being turned into an actual service through the hackathon and expanding beyond GS sites into industrial workplaces.
Huh Tae-soo said, "The ideas of employees who know the field best gained the power to change safety management in industrial workplaces when they met AI. I will actively support these challenges, which began at the hackathon, so they can take root in more workplaces beyond GS and lead to new value."
AIR originated from an idea proposed by five employees in the safety and machinery divisions of GS Power at the 3rd GS Group Hackathon. When a user enters a job title and a brief description, the AI automatically suggests potential hazards, risk levels, and preventive safety measures. It was developed by frontline employees, rather than software developers, using GS's AX platform, MISO. The service is now used at about 330 sites, including those operated by small and medium-sized enterprises.
To expand this type of field-oriented AI use, GS chose "Play with Generative AI Season 3: Build & Act" as this year's hackathon theme. The theme reflects the goal of creating AI-powered solutions that work in practice and connecting them to business and operational sites.
This year's event focuses on the use of AI-ready data. When the formats and standards of data accumulated at industrial sites differ, AI must first locate and process the data before it can use it. To reduce this bottleneck, GS has been refining and structuring data accumulated at business sites, including power plants and convenience stores, so that AI can use it.
GS's innovation organization, 52g, is organizing the operations, maintenance, and equipment-related field knowledge of GS Donghae Electric Power into a format that AI can read. It is also developing a power plant-specific model that understands field knowledge and work procedures.
At this year's hackathon, participants will develop solutions to field problems by combining AI-ready data with MISO. The goal is to reduce the time needed to prepare data and accelerate the implementation of ideas and their application in the field.
GS plans to expand the use of generative AI into industrial workplaces and develop AI solutions tailored to industry-specific tasks. It also plans to prepare for the field of physical AI, in which AI is combined with equipment and robots.
Saehong Hur, vice chairman and CEO of GS Caltex, delivered the opening address on behalf of the GS affiliates. Saehong Hur said, "The GS Group Hackathon is an opportunity to bring out and put into practice ideas that would not normally be easy to try. Over the next two days, I hope you will ask questions freely, take on challenges, and discover new possibilities."

[email protected] Kim Mi-hee Reporter