Korea Employers Federation calls for removal of outdated regulations hobbling AI, robotics and future industries

The Korea Employers Federation (KEF) on Monday called on the government to pursue bold and swift regulatory reform, releasing a set of cases in which the government accepted — in full or in part — deregulation proposals the KEF had submitted through its "Regulatory Reform Hotline."

The cases span three broad categories: future and emerging industries (four cases), the K-semiconductor sector (three cases), and the easing of operational difficulties at business sites (three cases).

In the future and emerging industries category, the KEF highlighted four cases: improvements to telemedicine regulations, including an amendment to the Medical Act last year and a revised telemedicine deregulation plan scheduled to take effect in December; the establishment of a system and incentives for vehicle-to-grid (V2G) bidirectional charging, with the government set to announce a "V2G Commercialization Master Plan"; the introduction of parking robots in apartment complexes, with legislation underway to allow parking robot installation in residential complexes under certain conditions; and the creation of safety certification standards for quadruped robots, with new operational safety certification criteria suited to articulated walking robots to be established following a regulatory sandbox pilot program.

The establishment of new safety certification standards for quadruped robots is drawing particular attention. As robotics applications expand across industries and global technology competition intensifies, the move is expected to strengthen the competitiveness of domestic companies.

Existing operational safety certification standards for outdoor service robots — those that operate autonomously or via remote control using conventional communications technology — were designed around wheeled (four-wheel) robots, which had constrained legged robots in pilot testing and commercialization.

Industry players had repeatedly noted that quadruped walking robots differ fundamentally from wheeled robots in their locomotion, postural balance control, obstacle-crossing methods on stairs and uneven terrain, and speed variation, making it difficult to verify their safety under certification standards built for four-wheeled robots.

In response, the KEF submitted proposals in October 2024 and November 2025 calling for operational safety certification standards and legislation suited to quadruped walking robots. The government plans to establish new certification criteria appropriate for articulated walking robots following a regulatory sandbox pilot program.

In the semiconductor sector, the KEF cited three achievements: the rationalization of fire department access window regulations for semiconductor factories, exempting factories taller than 44 meters from the mandatory installation of access windows; the easing of building height restrictions for semiconductor factories in industrial complexes, with the maximum height raised from 120 meters to 150 meters; and the establishment of standards for high-pressure gases used in semiconductor manufacturing processes.

The KEF also introduced three cases addressing operational difficulties at business sites: the easing of restrictions on the movement of unskilled foreign workers (E-9 visa holders) between construction sites, with the government pursuing improvements to the Employment Permit System; the rationalization of requirements for portable fire suppression equipment at construction sites, with a revision underway to recognize fire suppression facilities meeting certain performance standards as qualifying portable fire suppression devices; and improvements to the consistency of emissions calculations through the adjustment of the national power emission factor, with the publication cycle for the power emission factor shortened from three years to one year.

Kim Jae-hyun, head of the KEF's regulatory reform team, emphasized that in advanced industries such as AI, robotics and future vehicles, technological progress outpaces the speed of legal and institutional reform, and that regulations must be boldly removed before the commercialization stage. "We must secure the golden window for future industry growth by adopting a 'permit first, regulate later' principle," he stressed.

He added that the KEF would work with the public-private joint regulatory rationalization task force to pursue on-the-ground regulatory reform that businesses can actually feel.