Upstage, which is the only startup in the government’s independent artificial intelligence (AI) foundation model business and has recently attracted attention from the industry, has a leader from liberal arts with a rather unusual history. He is the co-founder and head of the education sector, who is in charge of upstage education.
He was a liberal arts graduate, but boldly jumped into the tech industry, starting his career at Nvidia in 2015 and leaving Nvidia in 2020 to start Upstage. It was only about six years before he became a co-founder of a startup after gaining experience in a global technology company.
The background of being a liberal arts graduate is often considered a weakness in technology-oriented industries. However, Sohn made it a starting point for differentiation, not an object to overcome. Rather than delving deeply into technology, he created his own role by focusing on understanding the problems and context that technology is trying to solve.
CEO Sohn cited “an attitude that is not afraid of questions” as the key to his rapid growth. “When I first joined Nvidia in 2015, I had the courage to admit that I didn’t know the biggest weapon for me,” CEO Sohn said in a recent meeting with Mail Business. “I barely understood the technical terms, but I changed my strategy and tried to understand them through metaphors instead of math formulas.”
He constantly asked the developers, “How would you compare this technology to elementary school students?” CEO Sohn said, “Asking points that anyone who knows technology too well would have passed for granted from the perspective of beginners and solving them easily became a differentiated competitiveness.” Based on the understanding gained through the question, he discovered and connected new problems and created his own role and place.
CEO Sohn cited “problem definition” and “communication” capabilities as more important competencies than knowing AI technology itself for liberal arts students. “In the end, it is important to clearly know what problems I want to solve and to pinpoint which parts are most effective to leave to AI,” he said. “As people and people work together to solve the problem, the ability to define how to communicate and coordinate with people based on the results created by AI will be the best weapon.”
Based on this philosophy, CEO Son is currently focusing his efforts on the field of education upstage. With the aim of cultivating AI talents across the country, they are actively spreading their experiences and ways of thinking to the educational field.
The Upstage curriculum he designed consists of dividing students into stages, such as AI users, partners, and innovators, and then experiencing the entire process of designing and applying AI solutions that fit their work environments, not just understanding the theory. In the end, this is a way that reflects his philosophy that only those who have proactively defined problems in their field can become real AI talents.
“In the past, only chefs could cook in restaurants, but now food ingredients managers and hall managers outside the kitchen have to use meal kits to come up with wonderful dishes,” CEO Sohn said. “We are focusing on education not only for chefs who make AI themselves, but also for everyone who can use a tool called AI to taste in their workplaces.”
In other words, it means that anyone, regardless of their expertise, can use AI in their own way to create results. CEO Sohn said, “It can no longer be an excuse for liberal arts students not to be good at coding,” adding, “Even if I don’t code myself, I should be the subject of accurately instructing AI to code.”
He also delivered a message to the students that “there is no safety without change.” CEO Sohn said, “The technology industry will continue to develop rapidly in the future, so it is important to try and learn even small things with AI right now,” adding, “It is ultimately up to humans to get new inspiration and verify critically.” The only survival strategy is to become a person who constantly expands his or her expertise with AI on his or her back, he stressed.
[Reporter Ahn Seonje]
