Anthropic Opens Seoul Office as Claude Adoption Soars in South Korea
Anthropic is officially setting up shop in Seoul, a move driven by surprisingly high adoption of its Claude AI model in South Korea. The company says Claude usage in the country is more than 3.5 times higher than expected based on its population, with most of that activity concentrated in technical and creative industries.
To lead the new office, Anthropic has hired KiYoung Choi, a tech veteran with three decades of experience in the Asia-Pacific region. Choi most recently served as the General Manager for Snowflake in Korea and has held senior country-level positions at Google Cloud, Adobe, Autodesk, and Microsoft Korea. His background is in helping large companies navigate major tech shifts like the move to cloud and AI.
Chris Ciauri, Anthropic’s head of international operations, said Choi’s understanding of the local market will be critical for building out a team to support Korean businesses. Both executives pointed to Korea as one of the world’s most advanced AI markets, thanks to its hardware leadership, active developer community, and high enterprise adoption rates.
The Seoul office will focus on developing a business strategy that fits local usage patterns. That means forging partnerships with enterprises and startups, working with government and research groups, and supporting developers who are building on the Claude API.
Several Korean companies are already using Anthropic’s technology. The country’s largest telecom provider, SK Telecom, is using Claude to build a custom AI model for its customer service teams. In the legal tech space, startup Law&Company has launched an AI legal assistant powered by Claude to help with legal research and document prep.
Anthropic isn’t walking into an empty market. Competitors like OpenAI already have a local presence. According to Q1 2026 data from investment platform Epic AI, Claude held a 31.7 percent share of Korea's generative AI market by payment volume, trailing ChatGPT’s 48.5 percent. Separate data from WiseApp in April 2026 ranked Claude third in monthly active users behind ChatGPT and Gemini.
The new office could also give Korean organizations better access to other Anthropic projects, like Mythos, its unreleased security-focused AI model. The company has already held cybersecurity workshops with Korean government agencies, including the Ministry of Science and ICT. As the office gets up and running, local cybersecurity firms could gain controlled access to the model. This expansion follows other recent business-focused moves from the company, like its new “Claude for Small Business” plan. Anthropic is already hiring for multiple roles in Seoul, signaling that it plans to expand its local team quickly.
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