Korea begins recruiting for a $1 billion biodata project
Korea officially launches a major biodata project
The South Korean government has started recruiting participants for the National Integrated Bio Big Data Construction Project.
The ambitious 606 billion won (over $400 million) project is Korea’s largest healthcare project to date, commissioned by the Korea Research Institute of Bioscience and Biotechnology.
The goal is to collect clinical and genomic data from one million individuals, including patients with rare diseases and serious conditions, over the next eight years. The resulting large database will be accessible to university and hospital researchers from 2026 to support research in precision medicine and digital health.
The project is led by the Ministries of Health and Welfare, Science and ICT, and Trade, Industry and Energy, and the Korea Disease Control and Prevention Agency.
AIIMS Delhi is setting up an AI development hub
The flagship unit of the All India Institute of Medical Sciences in New Delhi will set up an innovation hub for the development of AI solutions in healthcare.
The public medical university recently signed a Memorandum of Understanding with GE HealthCare’s joint venture in India, Wipro GE Healthcare, to establish the AI Health Innovations Hub. The latter is reportedly investing $1 million in this center over five years, to support the development, testing and deployment of AI-powered smart systems and workflow solutions in cardiology, oncology and neurology.
NEC Thailand sees nationwide expansion of digital elderly care
NEC Thailand is supporting the smart transformation of Umong, a municipality in Lamphun Province, Northern Thailand, by providing digital elderly care technology.
It signed a Memorandum of Understanding with the municipality to jointly develop a digital healthcare platform that connects to local medical facilities and supports long-term care for the elderly and patients with chronic diseases.
The project also includes the integration of fall detection technologies. There are also plans to introduce remote care technologies, including IoT devices.
NEC collaborated on a similar smart transformation project Chiang Mai last year. The initial success of the current project with Umong “will serve as a model for other municipalities in Thailand,” the report said.