Sung Kim

Sung Kim is the Co-Founder and Chief Executive Officer of Upstage, an artificial intelligence company established in 2020. He has led the company’s growth, focusing on developing AI solutions to support digital transformation across industries and society. 

From 2017 to 2020, he served as the Founding Head of NAVER Clova AI, where he designed large-scale projects that contributed to the establishment of NAVER’s AI ecosystem. In 1995, he co-founded Nara Vision Co., Ltd. and served as Chief Technology Officer, participating in the development of KkebiMail, one of Korea’s first webmail services.

Since 2009, he has been a Professor in the Department of Computer Science and Engineering at the Hong Kong University of Science and Technology (HKUST) (currently on leave). His research has been recognized with four Best Paper Awards and two Ten-Year Most Influential Paper Awards. He also created the online course "Deep Learning for Everyone", which has aided AI education efforts. Sung Kim holds a Bachelor of Science in Computer Engineering from Daegu University (1996), where he developed Kkachine, Korea’s first automated search engine. 

He later earned his Master of Science (2003) and Ph.D. (2006) in Computer Engineering from the University of California, Santa Cruz, with doctoral research focused on machine learning–based software bug prediction. 

Following this, he conducted postdoctoral research at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT).