South Korea's Ministry of Science and ICT said on Monday it will accept applications until April 30 for five new projects for 2026 under its on-device AI service demonstration and expansion programme.

On-device AI is a technology that analyses and judges data on the device itself without an internet connection. It offers fast response times and strong security, the ministry said, adding that demand is rising in the field for real-time decision-making such as disaster and safety.

Selected projects will receive about 2.9 billion won each over two years. Consortia will consist of a regional industry promotion agency as the lead, AI model and device companies as suppliers, and local governments as demand-side partners. The main theme must be one of transport and logistics, health and welfare, or disaster and safety, and projects must carry out large-scale city-level demonstrations. They will also run small-scale demonstrations using physical AI technology that integrates visual, language and behavioural processing as a sub-theme.

This year, the ministry will prioritise projects that go beyond simple risk recognition and link to immediate judgement and response. The approach is for AI to detect dangerous situations and automatically control equipment and issue alerts.

The ministry said it selected three projects in its 2025 call, including maritime drone coastal surveillance in Busan, early wildfire warnings in Hadong and Sancheong in South Gyeongsang province, and river algal bloom monitoring in Yeongju in North Gyeongsang province, and they are now under development and being demonstrated.

Park Tae-wan (박태완), director general for information and communications industry policy at the ministry, said on-device AI is a field with high growth potential due to its strengths in real-time performance and security. He said securing a range of demonstration references would help contribute to advancing to become one of the world's three leading AI powers.