NC AI will participate in South Korean government Physical AI research and development projects in North Jeolla and South Gyeongsang, expanding its manufacturing focus after falling short in an independent AI foundation-model project earlier this year. Overseen by the Ministry of Science and ICT and the National IT Industry Promotion Agency, the initiative will invest ₩1.4131 trillion, or about $1 billion, over five years from 2026 through 2030. The program aims to connect AI training in virtual environments with autonomous control of factory equipment and robots. In North Jeolla, NC AI will develop digital-twin environments, training and validation systems for vision-language and vision-language-action models, and foundation models for unmanned factories. In South Gyeongsang, it will develop world models and large action models for controlling equipment and robots in applications including shipbuilding welding and semiconductor back-end processes. NC AI is also pursuing physical AI projects with Hanwha Ocean, POSCO DX and Hyundai Rotem. First-half revenue increased 27.9% to ₩17.37737 billion, while operating profit fell 32.7% to ₩1.62148 billion and net profit declined 30.2% to ₩1.41961 billion. CEO Lee Yeon-soo said the projects will help apply virtually trained AI to manufacturing sites and support South Korea's industrial AI transformation.