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South Korea’s KB Kookmin Bank, one of the country’s largest banks, has won the mandate to arrange about 10.7 trillion won ($8 billion) in loans to build artificial intelligence computing capacity for Naver Cloud.
The mandate lands days after Naver signed a $9 billion infrastructure agreement with Brookfield that, Naver said, satisfied the precondition for U.S. chipmaker Nvidia’s planned $1 billion investment in the company.
KB Kookmin Bank will lead the financing process, including the loan’s structure and key terms, for a project valued at about 12.6 trillion won, according to Korean reports on the bank’s announcement Sunday. The reports called it South Korea’s first GPU financing and the country’s largest-ever syndicated loan arrangement.
A special-purpose company set up by Brookfield, the Canadian alternative asset manager, will acquire GPUs and other AI infrastructure. The equipment would be supplied to Naver Cloud under a long-term agreement. Other Korean institutions, including Hana, Shinhan and Woori banks and NH Investment & Securities, are reported to be joining the loan group.
Naver said on October 27 that signing the $9 billion computing-infrastructure agreement with Brookfield satisfied a precondition for Nvidia’s strategic equity investment in Naver. Under the structure, Brookfield will invest up to $9 billion through the asset company to acquire GPUs and data centers, while Naver and Naver Cloud operate what the companies call an AI factory, with Nvidia collaborating on next-generation computing platforms.
Operations are planned at 55 megawatts in the first half of 2027, scaling to 200 megawatts in 2028, with Naver’s GAK Sejong hyperscale data center as the core hub. Those are planned stages, not installed capacity.
For American readers, the takeaway is the scale of the financing behind the AI buildout: about $8 billion in planned loans – not yet closed – for a project in which U.S. chipmaker Nvidia plans a $1 billion equity investment in Naver. Naver said the structure ties usage-fee payments to business revenue, easing the burden of the heavy upfront spending that AI infrastructure demands, and agreed to guarantee Naver Cloud’s usage-payment obligations for up to eight years – a guarantee, the company said, that does not by itself create cash outflows.
The reports did not specify an interest rate, maturity or closing date. Winning the mandate does not mean the planned loans have closed.
JBizNews Desk | Seoul
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