Sapeon Korea Inc. and Rebellions Inc., two artificial intelligence (AI) chipmakers in South Korea, have signed a formal merger agreement.In June, the two companies said they sought a merger as they seek to improve competitiveness in the global market for AI chips.The merged entity will be named Rebellions, company officials said.Sapeon Korea is an AI chip processor affiliate of SK Telecom Co., the nation's leading mobile carrier, and Rebellions is an AI chip fabless startup, established in 2020.Sapeon Korea created the country's first AI chip for data centers in 2020, and last year, Rebellions developed an AI system-on-chip, named ATOM, which supports large language models.The two companies said their integrated entity is expected to have a corporate value of over 1 trillion won (US$740.2 million) to have stronger competitiveness in the global AI chip market."We were able to make this merger agreement as investors and major business partners of both companies showed great determination and suppor t under the belief that the nation should put in an all-out effort to help its AI chip industry make a leap," said Rebellions CEO Park Sung-hyun, who is set to lead the merged entity.Source: Yonhap News Agency