Soonwon Ka
ML Research Engineer
Seoul,South Korea
Summary
Innovative Tech Lead at NAVER Corp with expertise in LLM frameworks and a strong focus on performance optimization. Successfully enhanced AI solutions for search/feed experiences and contributed to generative AI services. Proven ability in technical problem solving and communication skills, driving impactful research outcomes and productivity improvements. Personally a global nomad into local culture exploration.
Overview
9
9
years of professional experience
8
8
years of post-secondary education
3
3
Languages
Work History
Tech Lead, ML Research Engineer
NAVER Corp
Seongnam-si, Gyeonggi-do
11.2023 - Current
- Collaborated with product managers to define technical requirements and develop optimized solutions for AI transformation of feed & search experiences, i.e., Homefeed & AI Briefing.
- Enhanced inference efficiency (QPS per GPU) by 20 times without generation quality loss by LLM distillation.
- Conducted multimodal model research for image-to-text alignment (Retrievers & VLMs).
- Played a role as a solver to proactively identify and remove bottlenecks in progress.
ML Research Engineer
NAVER Corp
Seongnam-si, Gyeonggi-do
04.2021 - 10.2023
- Conducted LLM-based research & development to release cutting-edge generative-AI services for both sellers and customers, i.e., AI Cuesheet and CLOVA for Writing (RAG).
- Presented research findings at conferences and workshops, contributing valuable insights to the broader scientific community (from model pre-training to AI writer application).
- Implemented meta outputs of generative AI pipelines to improve team productivity (LLM-based synthetic data generation & filtering).
Researcher Assistant & Engineer
Soundl.ly
01.2016 - 04.2019
- Implemented and optimized a software based ultrasound communication modem for sound QR marketing solutions among smartphones.
- Conducted rigorous quality assurance tests, identifying areas of improvement for product optimization.
Education
Master of Science - Electrical And Computer Engineering
Seoul National University
Seoul, South Korea 03.2014 - 02.2016
Bachelor of Science - Electric Engineering
Seoul National University
Seoul, South Korea 03.2008 - 02.2014
Skills
Technical problem solving
Team collaboration
Performance optimization
Data-driven decision making
LLM framework knowledge (HuggingFace, VLLM, SGLANG)
Publications
- Lee et al., Navigating the Path of Writing: Outline-guided Text Generation with Large Language Models, Feb. 2025 (accepted to NACCL 2025 Industry Track).
- Cho et al., DSAI: Unbiased and Interpretable Latent Feature Extraction for Data-Centric AI, Dec. 2024 (Arxiv).
- Yoo et al., HyperCLOVA X Technical Report, Apr. 2024 (Arxiv).
- Park et al., HyperT5: Towards Compute-Efficient Korean Language Modeling, Jul. 2023 (ACL 2023 Industry Track).
- Kwak et al., No Entry: Anti-noise Energy Detector for Chirp-based Acoustic Communication, Jun. 2019 (SECON 2019).
- Ka et al., Near-ultrasound Communication for TV's 2nd Screen Services, Oct. 2016 (MobiCom 2016).
Accomplishments
- Oral presentation at NAVER DAN 2024 for LLM distillation (https://dan.naver.com/24/sessions/634)
- Online presentation at D2 NAVER 2024 for LLM distillation (https://d2.naver.com/helloworld/8866888)
- Online presentation at D2 NAVER 2024 for writing AI (https://d2.naver.com/helloworld/8011540)
- Oral presentation at NAVER DEVIEW 2023 for seq2seq model domain adaptation (https://deview.kr/2023/sessions/554)
Timeline
Tech Lead, ML Research Engineer
NAVER Corp
11.2023 - Current
ML Research Engineer
NAVER Corp
04.2021 - 10.2023
Researcher Assistant & Engineer
Soundl.ly
01.2016 - 04.2019
Master of Science - Electrical And Computer Engineering
Seoul National University
03.2014 - 02.2016
Bachelor of Science - Electric Engineering
Seoul National University
03.2008 - 02.2014
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