Korean firms expand sourcing, inspection and retail AI

Sourcing China is positioning itself as a full-stack partner for Korean companies operating in China, covering supplier discovery, price negotiations, quality inspection, logistics and customs clearance. Founded in 2020 to address on-the-ground sourcing challenges, the company connects its website to 1688 through its own API, operates a branch in Yiwu and has obtained ISO 9001 quality management system certification. One early client has grown to annual revenue of more than 10 billion won.

Korea Alps is replacing sensory inspection with AI vision checks across its automotive electronics and components operations. Founded in 1987, the company runs about 300 production lines, with 40% of shop-floor workers assigned to inspection. It aims to reduce a 5% false-defect rate, which costs an average of 5 million won a month to process, to below 0.33%, add three more autonomous mobile robots at its roughly 46,000-square-meter plant by next year and apply AI vision inspection to half of all equipment by 2028.

Samsung Electronics introduced an AI promoter at IFA 2026 that uses a large language model to answer shopper questions, compare products and switch languages during conversations. Gmarket is also moving shopping into ChatGPT through a plug-in that enables product discovery and recommendations without visiting its app or website, while Aekyung Industrial and CJ Olive Young are expanding into overseas hair care and combined beauty-wellness retail formats.