South Korean generative AI startup 42Maru has received strategic investment from Naver Cloud. This follows a business agreement signed with Naver Cloud in December of the previous year to collaborate on the hyper-scale AI project, ‘HyperCLOVA X.’ The partnership was further solidified through a Series B funding round focusing on HyperCLOVA X. This investment aims to enhance technological cooperation and maximize business synergy between the two companies, leveraging Naver’s large-scale AI platform, HyperCLOVA X. Importantly, the integration of 42Maru’s RAG42 with HyperCLOVA X will enable the development of specialized engines for various industrial sectors, providing a comprehensive one-stop service from RAG (Retrieval-Augmented Generation) consulting to LLM (Large Language Model) solution development.

42Maru has noted that this investment reflects the high regard for its impressive technological capabilities and innovation in the global generative AI field. The firm’s diverse, commercially proven use cases over the years have significantly contributed to attracting this investment.

Taegun Lim, Executive Vice President of Naver Cloud, stated, “With this strategic investment following our business alliance with 42Maru, we aim to achieve concrete results in the generative AI domain using HyperCLOVA X, realizing our shared goals. We look forward to exploring the future of hyper-scale AI technology and pursuing sustained innovation in the AI field alongside 42Maru through our collaborative efforts.”

As a generative AI startup, 42Maru addresses the common hallucination phenomenon in hyper-scale language models with its proprietary RAG42, enhanced by search-augmented generation technology, and MRC42, an AI comprehension tool. The company supports a private mode for businesses, allowing them to safely utilize hyper-scale AI without concerns about internal data breaches or customer information leaks. This strategy enables them to cost-effectively implement specialized, lightweight models tailored to specific industrial sectors.

Dong-hwan Kim, CEO of 42Maru, remarked, “This investment is a testament to 42Maru’s technological prowess and market performance, as well as a precious opportunity to accelerate innovation in generative AI technology through our close collaboration with Naver Cloud. This strategic investment and strengthened partnership will mark a significant milestone for 42Maru in delivering industry-specific solutions and creating real business value, reinforcing our leadership in monetizing AI by consistently identifying successful proof-of-concept cases.”