Korea’s government project to build a homegrown artificial intelligence (AI) foundation model is facing mounting criticism after the government tore up its own competition rule, abruptly deciding to allow "a wild card entry" for a consortium that had been eliminated in earlier selection rounds or had not been participated in the process in the first place. The Ministry of Science and ICT on Thursday announced that three consortia — led by LG AI Research, SK Telecom and Upstage — advanced to the second phase of the national foundation model project, dropping two teams led by Naver Cloud and NC AI. The project selected five consortia for the first phase after dropping big-name tech firms such as Kakao and KT. The ministry had originally planned to eliminate one team at each stage across three phases, leaving only two teams by the end of the year. However, it eliminated two consortia in the evaluation for the second phase and abruptly announced it would recruit one additional consortium to join the project from the second phase, while guaranteeing the same supports such as graphics p