NVIDIA Puts $1B Into NAVER as Furiosa AI Closes $623M Round

NAVER will raise $1 billion from NVIDIA through a third-party share allotment paid November 6, a deal that hands the chipmaker roughly a 4.8% stake and funds NAVER's AI factory expansion. The same week, Seoul-based AI chip startup Furiosa AI closed a $623 million Series D at a post-money valuation near $2.89 billion — one of the largest funding rounds in Korean startup history.

Two deal structures, one direction. A listed internet giant selling equity to a chipmaker and a startup raising historic capital both point the same way: Korea wants to own more of its own AI compute stack.

Who backed Furiosa AI's record round?

The Series D consortium includes Korea Development Bank, NAVER, and Kakao Investment. Furiosa AI designs AI chips, placing it directly in the hardware layer of the AI stack that Korea has historically imported. The round's size — $623 million — puts it among the largest in Korean startup history, per WOWTALE's Korean Startup Weekly #142, covering Oct. 26–Nov 1, 2026.

Korean capital is also reaching abroad. Doonamu & Partners invested in U.S. space data center startup Starcloud, extending Korean money into overseas AI infrastructure — not just overseas startups.

What else raised money this week?

Seven more Korean startups closed rounds at home, alongside two new funds:

• NanoForge AI raised an $11 million seed led by Mirae Asset Venture Investment, with Futureplay, Mashup Ventures, DSC Investment, and KDB participating, to accelerate AI-driven materials discovery.
• AIZ Entertainment raised a KRW 20 billion Series A from Kakao Games and Krafton. Former Kakao CEO Namgung Hoon leads the company, which is building a chatbot game messenger.
• Amogy, an ammonia power startup, secured $20 million from Korea Eximbank as lead investor in an ongoing $200 million Series C for mass production of zero-carbon power modules.
• Lotus Materials, an Inha University spinout, took $1.5 million from the Incheon Innovation Mother Fund's fifth vehicle to develop power-semiconductor bonding material.
• Multiscale Instrument, an atomic force microscope developer, raised an undisclosed amount from Seoul Techno Holdings for measurement equipment used in next-generation semiconductor fabrication.
• Fapis, a used-luxury platform, raised funding from Baemin founder Bongjin Kim and opened a flagship store in Nonhyeon.
• QBlack AI, a computer vision platform, raised seed funding from Partners Lounge and Korea Investment Accelerator.

On the fund side, JB Financial Group formed a $23 million AI fund and made its first investment in AI security startup CipherData. Separately, Mirae Asset backed a U.S. biotech's $350 million round abroad.

What did the government announce?

Four industrial strategies landed in a single week, all multi-year plans rather than direct startup funding:

• The Ministry of SMEs and Startups unveiled a KRW 5 trillion-plus "3X" smart-manufacturing strategy linking digital, AI, and robot transformation through 2030.
• A separate KRW 600 billion climate-tech financing push targets 1,000 climate-tech firms and 30 pre-unicorns.
• The Ministry of Health and Welfare announced a pharma-bio "frontier" program backing 200 companies with KRW 60 billion in investment and KRW 90 billion in guarantees by 2030.
• The SME ministry built a 538-company "new security" innovation candidate pool spanning AI, robotics, aerospace, drones, cybersecurity, and quantum.

How are SME exports trending?

Korean SME exports hit $33.43 billion in the third quarter, up 8.8% year-on-year — the best third quarter on record, led by beauty and semiconductors. The same report showed small-manufacturer output down 4.0% and new business formation down 9.5% in August, though tech-sector startup formation rose 10.1%. A mixed signal, not a clean trend.

The trade ministry also named 188 K-export strategy products across beauty, fashion, lifestyle, and food to support overseas retail placement.

Where are Korean startups expanding?

EdTech startup EduSync joined a Europe accelerator run by Korea's KODIT alongside HEC Paris and Station F. AI interior-design startup Archisketch became a partner for SoftBank's "Wonship" in Japan. EdTech startup Edutem supplied an AI-based Korean-language platform to the University of Washington.

With NVIDIA's $1 billion entering NAVER on November 6 and four state strategies running through 2030, Korea's AI push now has both private capital and policy behind it.