South Korean construction project management firm HanmiGlobal is setting up a U.S. subsidiary to develop small modular reactor (SMR) projects, positioning the country's nuclear supply chain to sell into a wave of AI data center power demand that U.S. utilities are struggling to meet on their own.
Washington seminar sets the strategy
HanmiGlobal outlined the plan at a seminar in Washington, D.C., co-hosted with the Global America Business Institute. Attendees included data center operator EdgeCore, utility Dominion Energy and the Edison Electric Institute, alongside SMR developers TerraPower, ARC Clean Technology and CORE POWER. From the Korean side, Doosan Enerbility, POSCO International and KEPCO Engineering & Construction joined to discuss supply-chain roles.
What the new company will do
The unit will run the full SMR project lifecycle — early-stage planning, licensing, design, procurement, construction management and grid interconnection — and act as the go-to-market channel for Korean nuclear design, equipment and construction firms in the U.S. market. HanmiGlobal already owns Portland, Ore.-based engineering firm OTAK, giving it local project delivery experience in semiconductors, batteries and submarine cables.
Building on 2026 alliances
The U.S. move builds on a January strategic alliance with KEPCO Engineering & Construction and Turner & Townsend for global nuclear pursuits, and a May 2026 agreement with AtkinsRéalis to jointly chase U.S. nuclear and industrial plant work. HanmiGlobal is also providing project management support for Shin Hanul reactors 3 and 4 in South Korea and life-extension work at Romania's Cernavodă Unit 1.
Why now
U.S. SMR demand is being driven by the electricity load from AI training and inference clusters. That has spurred deals such as Valar Atomics' $1B Sequoia round at a $6B valuation, Applied Atomics licensing BWXT's mPower SMR and the SGE consortium's 14-unit BWRX-300 UK fleet bid. The U.S. SMR market, HanmiGlobal argued, has "significant growth potential as AI data centers expand and electricity demand rises."
Reporting based on coverage from Asia Today, UPI, The Korea Herald, The Investor and Seoul Economic Daily.