Chapter 0. Declaration
0-1Defining statement
- "A region runs its own services, and at the same time grows the technology and the people who build those services."
- One-line summary — "When local people build and run a local everyday-economy platform, the region comes back to life." (Proposal to the Ministry of the Interior and Safety, October 2026)
0-2Definition of success
- Success means the spread of this platform, not commercial success (decided 28 September 2026)
- Expansion target — of the 243 local governments (17 metropolitan and 226 basic, Ministry of the Interior and Safety / Statistics Korea e-National Indicators): 3 in 2027 → 15 → 60 → 100 (target)
- Reference models — Palantir became a platform through a data operating system, field engineers and bootcamps; Mozilla through open standards and a foundation structure. LocalON OS takes from both only "what became a standard", and does not adopt vendor-centred operation.
0-3What this white paper will not change and what it may change
| Category | Content |
|---|---|
| Will not change | ① The permanently open areas in Chapter 2 (open common foundation, data standard, integration specifications) ② The permanent free right of use for regional operating organisations ③ Data is owned by the local government ④ The succession clause for code and trademarks if development stops or the company is dissolved ⑤ The 3 certification conditions |
| May change | The composition and unit prices of revenue sources, the form of the regional operating organisation, the scope of functional modules, the order of expansion |
- What will not change is written into the licence and the Contributor License Agreement (CLA), not the company's articles of incorporation, so that it holds regardless of changes in governance.
0-4Position of this white paper
- This white paper contains principles only. Business plans, proposals and presentations quote principles from this white paper; figures, schedules and unconfirmed matters are managed in separate reference documents.
- The Public Edition contains only the principle chapters. It does not include the economic structure, internal execution procedures or matters under review.
Chapter 2. What LocalON OS Standardises
2-1Four platforms + two execution systems
| Layer | Name | What it holds |
|---|---|---|
| ④ LocalON AI | Region-specific AI | Regional data + general-purpose AI → conversation, booking and ordering with the world |
| ③ LocalON Operations | Regional operating system | Division of roles among local government, the regional operating organisation and the specialist organisation |
| ② LocalON Data | Regional data foundation | Accumulates service usage data as a relational model |
| ① LocalON Core | Common service foundation | Members and permissions, products and content, orders, bookings, payments, vouchers, settlement, delivery, civil petitions, facility booking, policies and benefits, tourism |
| Execution system ① | Field Engineering | Working practitioners build together with local developers and transfer the technology |
| Execution system ② | Bootcamp | A hands-on programme that trains teams to build and run services for their own region |
- If each region builds its own ordering, payment and booking functions, they are built and maintained 243 times. LocalON OS builds them once, and 243 regions improve them together.
2-2Three-layer structure and ownership
| Layer | Managed by | Openness | What it holds |
|---|---|---|---|
| ① Open common foundation | LocalON OS headquarters | Fully open · permanent | Order state machine, permissions, settlement, monitoring, install/update/backup/recovery tools, synthetic data, automated tests, technical documentation, data standard schema, integration specifications (standard API) |
| ② Regional settings and functional modules | Regional operating organisation | Chosen by the region | Regional name, design, policy values, service area / tourism and booking, regional commerce, local logistics functional modules |
| ③ Operational control | Responsible local government official | Not open | Authentication keys, payment keys, secrets, residents' personal data and actual transaction data, operational databases, backups, audit records |
- What layer ③ keeps closed is secrets and actual data, not programs. The authentication and payment integration programs are open.
- The open common foundation separates the processing layer from the external integration layer and publishes the boundary as a standard API. A region can replace a specific layer with its own implementation if needed.
2-3Data standard — regional data relational model
- Regional AI can only be built when the region can be understood as data. Objects and relationships are stored together.
| Object | Main relationships | Originating service |
|---|---|---|
| Resident | Use, purchase, booking, application | All |
| Business and shop | Sales, settlement, support programmes | Economy app, monitoring |
| Product and service | Production, sales, delivery | Independent store, ordering |
| Place and tourist site | Links to lodging, festivals, commercial districts | Tourism, booking |
| Policy and support programme | Matching with businesses and residents | Benefits, civil petitions |
| Transaction | Resident↔shop↔voucher | Payment, settlement |
- Data governance — the holder of residents' personal data, transaction data, public information and AI training data is the local government. Only aggregated and pseudonymised data is used for analysis and AI. Data is not used for profit. (Proposal to the Ministry of the Interior and Safety, Appendices A19 and A36)
- The region chooses its integration scope from 4 levels — Local (our region only) / Cross-regional (other regions) / National (all of Korea) / Global (the whole world) (decided 8 October 2026)
2-4Design principles
| Principle | Content |
|---|---|
| Distributed installation | The open common foundation is installed in each region. Transactions in one living area are processed by that region's installation, and nationwide transactions are not concentrated on one server. |
| Technology neutrality | It must be possible to build, run and modify the software with free development tools only, without assuming any specific commercial compiler, specific vendor or the participation of a specific individual. |
| Public-sector adoption standards | Principle of applying the e-Government Standard Framework, public security standards (CSAP compliance), separation of access rights, encryption, audit logs, backup and recovery |
| No holding of prepaid balances | The open common foundation does not hold or manage prepaid balances. Local currency top-ups and balances are handled by the existing issuing system; the common foundation only sends payment authorisation requests and receives the results. |
| Integration first | Public delivery apps, delivery agencies, voucher operating agencies and existing local government systems are integration targets, not competitors. LocalON covers everyday life, public services and sales channels beyond delivery, and orders that come in are passed on to existing apps. |
| No in-house delivery workforce | Delivery staff are not hired directly; LocalON integrates with the networks of local delivery agency branches through a standard API. |
2-5Licence and succession
| Item | Content |
|---|---|
| Open licence | The open common foundation is released under the AGPL, and contributions from both individuals and companies are managed through a CLA (copyright assignment + patent grant) — copyright must be held by headquarters for the succession clause and relicensing to work. The DCO is used only to confirm commits by CLA signatories. |
| Separation of integration modules | Payment and authentication modules run as separate processes and communicate only across an HTTP/gRPC boundary (to control the scope of licence disclosure obligations). |
| Permanent free right of use | Regional operating organisations are granted a permanent free right of use. Joint ownership of patents and trademarks by local governments is excluded, and a free licence to use them is granted instead. |
| Succession clause | If headquarters stops development or is dissolved, the code, trademarks and patents are transferred to an alliance of regional operating organisations or to a public-interest foundation. |
| Forks | Forking is guaranteed as a right, but official support (long-term support, security patches, registry listing) applies only to verified versions. When regional improvements are fed back into the common foundation, the maintenance burden moves to headquarters. |
| Installation channels | 3 channels: development / stable / long-term support. Regional installations use only stable or long-term support versions, and long-term support is aligned with local government contract cycles. |
| Release order | Source code release always follows the order "secure the filing date, then release". |
2-6What the moat is
- Open source is not a moat. The AGPL only makes copying easier. Palantir's moat is not its code but ① the ontology applied to customer data → switching costs ② security certifications (FedRAMP High December 2024, IL6 October 2022) ③ domain knowledge accumulated by field engineers; analysts rank ontology-based switching costs first (Morningstar, "After earnings: is Palantir a buy, sell or fairly valued", 13 May 2026).
| LocalON OS moat | Content | Why it is hard to copy |
|---|---|---|
| ① Cross-regional connected data | Data from N regions built on the same ontology is connected (tourist routes, agricultural products from producing area → consuming area, wide-area circulation of vouchers) | A later entrant has to start from 1 region and is not connected to the existing N. The average revenue of Palantir's top 20 customers grew from $24.8M (2019, S-1) to $108M (trailing 12 months to 2026 Q1, 10-Q) because data integration within customers deepened. |
| ② Network of trained people | Each region has developers whose grade is set by the number of certified successors, and leads move between regions | A competitor can buy the software but cannot buy the people in that region who can fix it. Palantir's Sankar: "Hiring FDEs is in fashion, but the point is to stay close to the hardest problems" (November 2025) |
| ③ Public-sector verified qualifications | One security verification, listing on the Digital Service Use Support System, Innovative Product designation (sole-source contracts for up to 6 years) | Takes new entrants several years. These qualifications are obtained in the name of headquarters. |
| ④ Switching costs | When vouchers, facility booking, civil petitions and policy coupons are tied into one ontology, the cost of removing one of them equals the cost of replacing the whole | However, these switching costs must coexist with the exit-right clause (4-4). The moat is that local governments can leave but choose not to; preventing them from leaving is not a moat but a migration barrier. |
- What is not a moat — feature lists, screens, patents alone, price. These can be copied within 2 years.
- Order of building the moat — ③ qualifications (by the second half of 2027) → ① connected data (once 3 or more regions are in operation) → ② people (once the first cohort of certified successors is produced) → ④ switching costs (5 or more integrated services per region)
Chapter 3. Organisation and Governance
3-1Roles of the three organisations
| Organisation | Nature | Responsibilities | Funding | Not responsible for |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| LocalON OS headquarters | For-profit company | Developing, managing and distributing the open common foundation; owning and revising the open rules; holding trademarks and patents and granting free licences; review gate; certification decisions; security response; long-term support | Subscription service fees for the open common foundation (local governments), optional AI tools, sponsorship and donations | Directly operating regional services; involvement in personnel matters of regional operating organisations |
| LocalON OS Talent Development Institute | For-profit (pursuing social enterprise certification) | Free education (introduction and concepts), paid education (development and operation — certificate of completion, a qualification once registered as a private qualification), consulting and build support for local governments, running 1-year contract leads, exit advisory | Tuition (from educational institutions and national education funds, not from local governments), consulting contracts | Owning the open common foundation or trademarks, approving releases, directing the work of regional operating organisation staff, job placement |
| Regional operating organisation | Form chosen by the local government — a regional super-app development social enterprise, a regional cooperative, a regional digital facility management team, or another form (all at the same level) | Operating and developing ○○ON (regional instance named after the region, e.g. NajuON); combining, releasing, monitoring and backing up settings and functional modules; on-site support; training successors | Local government recurring personnel and operating costs, personnel costs from job programmes, transaction fees, advertising and partnerships (retained in the region) | Modifying the open common foundation alone, revising rule files, holding payment or authentication keys |
- The "LocalON specialist organisation" in the proposal to the Ministry of the Interior and Safety is headquarters and the Talent Development Institute combined, and the "regional operating organisation" is as shown in the table above.
3-3Governance rules that do not change
| Rule | Content |
|---|---|
| Review gate | People are responsible for 4 things — code review / permission management / security testing / release approval — and these are not delegated to automation. Only contributions that pass the quality gate are merged into the common foundation. |
| Agent principle | Agents produce only materials, drafts and checklists; they do not make decisions. Merging, releasing, signing, contract renewal and completion decisions are made by people. |
| Separation of authority | Payment keys, authentication keys and audit records are held only by the responsible official, regardless of the form of the regional operating organisation. Final release approval is also given by the responsible official. |
| Conflicts of interest | Owners and executives of the Talent Development Institute, regional operating organisations and affiliated ACs and VCs do not take part in headquarters' certification and review assessments. Staff of the Talent Development Institute hold no more than 1 seat on headquarters' decision-making body. |
| Personal records stay in the region | Personal records (grades, scores, certification evidence) do not leave the regional operating organisation. External bodies submit only module-, contract- and training-level records. |
| Conflict-of-interest register | Shareholdings, contracts and family relationships are recorded in a register, and recusal from assessment is applied. The head of a regional operating organisation discloses any interests with the local government on appointment. |
Chapter 4. Regional Adoption Standard
4-1Three certification conditions
- Use of the LocalON OS backend platform (installation method is free — self-installation or the central hosting route)
- Acceptance of the operating method (use copies of the 6 rule files without revising them)
- Acceptance of the training method and curriculum
- If the conditions are not met, only the use of the LocalON name and the certification are suspended. The right to use the source code remains.
4-2Adoption procedure — based on a 12-month pilot
| Order | Stage | Period | Content |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Install LocalON Core | Months 1–2 | Common foundation + regional settings (7 categories: identity, region, policy, economy, operation, legal, integration) |
| 2 | Form the regional development and operations team | Months 1–3 | Regional operating organisation + Bootcamp |
| 3 | Integrate 3–5 regional services | Months 3–6 | Vouchers, facility booking, civil petitions, etc. |
| 4 | Build the regional data model | Months 4–8 | Relational model + governance |
| 5 | Resident pilot | Months 6–11 | Operation in a pilot living area |
| 6 | Regional AI PoC | Months 9–12 | Multilingual conversation → booking and ordering |
- Interim review at 6 months · final verification at 12 months. Delivery sequence: months 1–6 web app (3 core services) → months 7–12 native app → from month 13, additional categories
- 3 delivery types — ① link with an already adopted public delivery app ② link with delivery agencies ③ public circuit delivery. Chosen according to local conditions.
4-3Verification stages 1–6
| Stage | Subject of verification | Criteria | Current status |
|---|---|---|---|
| Stage 1 | Technical implementation | A working system in which 6 user roles are connected | Met |
| Stage 2 | Regional operation | The regional operating organisation performs settings, releases and support / 30-day repurchase rate of 30% excluding discounts | Not started |
| Stage 3 | Operating system established | A follow-on region installs, runs and updates using public documents only / build cost is 50% or less of the first case | Not started |
| Stage 4 | Open software | At least 1 contribution from an external developer merged | Not started |
| Stage 5 | Institutional adoption | Annual operating costs included as a recurring item in a local government budget | Not started |
| Stage 6 | Becoming infrastructure | 1 scheduled release carried out without the founder, 3 or more regions operating at the same time | Not started |
- 2 preconditions for Stage 3 — ① AI tools can be used in the local government environment (to be confirmed first) ② the switch to self-installation has been completed
- "Not started" means verification has not yet begun; it is not a result.
- Judgement bands for the build cost of a follow-on region — 50% or less of the first case: met / over 50% and under 70%: partially met, improve the way settings are applied and retest once within 6 months / 70% or more: not met, redesign the structure
4-413 mandatory agreement clauses
| No. | Clause | Basis |
|---|---|---|
| 1 | Exclusion of joint ownership of patents and trademarks by the local government; grant of a free licence to the local government | Incheon Metropolitan City case |
| 2 | Deadline for handing over all data in a standard format at the local government's request | Seoul Metropolitan Government case |
| 3 | The local government keeps a copy of all source code, settings and documents | Chapter 2 |
| 4 | Actual testing of whether a replacement operator can take over | Chapter 2 |
| 5 | Explicit clause on where interest and income from advance payments belong | Bucheon City and Gunpo City cases |
| 6 | Conditions for budgeting operating staff as recurring personnel costs (development staff rotate every 2 years) | Chapter 5 |
| 7 | Payment keys, authentication keys and audit records held only by the responsible official | Chapter 3 |
| 8 | Contract type by form of regional operating organisation (facility management team operates directly; other forms are commissioned per unit of work); secondment prohibited | Chapter 3 |
| 9 | Advance notice period to merchants and residents and return of data if the service is discontinued | 2-5 succession clause |
| 10 | Responsible party and complaint handling procedure in case of a transaction dispute | Set at agreement |
| 11 | Sharing of the method for measuring the repurchase rate excluding discounts and of the discontinuation criteria | Set at agreement |
| 12 | Acceptance of the 3 certification conditions | 4-1 |
| 13 | The local government does not request individual evaluation records of specific staff | Chapter 3 |
Chapter 5. People — Developer Training and Rotation
5-2Division of roles
| Role | Responsibilities | Affiliation |
|---|---|---|
| Service owner | Priorities, budget, inter-department coordination, performance management | Responsible official |
| Technical lead | Design, code review, requesting release approval, technical handover | Regional operating organisation (in the first case, held concurrently by staff hired by the Talent Development Institute) |
| Operations and security | Monitoring, backup, incident response | Regional operating organisation |
| Field and customer support | Support for residents and merchants, merchant training | Regional operating organisation |
| Talent and partnerships | Linking regional universities, educational institutions and developers to projects | Regional operating organisation + Talent Development Institute |
5-3Education — free and paid
- The training content is not the grammar of a specific programming language but requirements definition, system architecture design, directing AI tools and running the review gate.
| Category | Course | Target | Outcome |
|---|---|---|---|
| Free | Introduction, concepts, overview | Universities, primary and secondary schools, vocational training institutes, local governments, anyone | Educational institutions can run it themselves with open teaching materials |
| Paid | Development course (3 days) | Local university students, local resident developers, people wishing to return to the region, instructors | Certificate of completion, eligibility for the qualification exam |
| Paid | Operations course (2 days) | Responsible officials, field and customer support staff | Certificate of completion |
| Paid | Advanced operations practice and technical lead | Development course graduates, experienced staff | Certificate of completion, prerequisite for being granted operating rights |
| Long-term | Bootcamp, 6 stages | Teams of 4 · 600 hours | A working service for our region + an operating team |
- Bootcamp 6 stages — Understanding LocalON Core → Regional settings → API and data integration → Regional module development → QA, security and release → Live operation. The outcome of the training is not a certificate but a working regional service.
- The certificate of completion (a qualification once registered as a private qualification) is "a qualification to teach LocalON OS classes" and is not a hiring requirement. Each regional operating organisation decides its own hiring.
- Confirmed results — Catholic Kwandong University ANCHOR Project Group, Tium Startup Camp 2026: 8 non-developer teams completed platforms capable of taking payments in a 3-day course / 5-week course for staff of the Korean Patent Attorneys Association: built an AI agent connected to their work database. These results are evidence of the speed of entry into development, not evidence of operation and maintenance capability.
5-4Career path
| Order | Stage | Period | Rules |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Education | — | Completion of a paid course at the Talent Development Institute or a course at a certified educational institution |
| 2 | Open-ended employment contract with the regional operating organisation (development roles rotate every 2 years, employment is maintained) | 2-year cycle | Newcomers choose their mentor by application (no assignment). Grade is set only by the cumulative number of certified successors — Developer → Module lead → Development lead. No dismissal; role contracts are renewed every 2 years (renewal selection sheet) |
| 3 | 1-year contract lead at the Talent Development Institute | 1 year | Full advisory for the local government concerned, coaching of successor leads. Advisory on ACs, VCs, HR, investment and career moves |
| 4 | Exit | — | Starting a business, changing jobs, heading a new regional operating organisation, corporate or overseas start-ups. The only exception for staying is 1 technical lead |
- Development staff rotate every 2 years as a rule, and gaps are prevented through decision and incident records, successor certification and a 4-week handover overlap. For operations staff, budgeting recurring personnel costs at the time of hiring (open-ended employment contract) is set as an agreement condition.
- The mentor submits 3 types of successor certification evidence (release logs, incident response records, code review records), and the decision is made by 1 development lead from another regional operating organisation + 1 headquarters reviewer. The terms "pass" and "fail" are not used.
Chapter 7. Expansion and Connection
7-2Lowering adoption barriers — the only means of expansion
- Headquarters has no authority to make adoption mandatory, so lowering the burden is the only means of expansion.
| Burden | Response |
|---|---|
| Lengthy contracting procedures | Sole-source contracts under the Digital Service Specialised Contract System (on condition of obtaining cloud security certification); sole-source contracts with social enterprises and cooperatives |
| Difficulty securing initial budget | No budget for external build costs. Recombining existing job, education and informatisation budgets |
| No way to verify before contracting | Synthetic-data test environment provided in advance; observation of a 30-minute demonstration |
| Difficulty migrating data when changing provider | Data transfer specification and handover deadline stated in the agreement |
| Difficulty self-installing | A headquarters-operated hosting (SaaS) route is opened from the first case — listing under the Digital Service Specialised Contract requires SaaS provision. 3 agreement conditions are mandatory: data is owned by the local government, switching to self-installation is possible at any time, and the switching cost is 50% or less of the initial build cost. Self-installation is proven separately in Stage 3 verification. |
- Local government procurement specifications do not name a specific product; they state the requirement as "compliance with an open software licence and the data standard (2-3)" (principle of not specifying particular products or specifications). Eligibility to bid is not limited to certified regional operating organisations.
7-5OpenKorea — connecting to the world
- OpenKorea (working name, domain openkorea.co.kr secured, trademark OpenKorea OS to be filed) is a national gateway where foreigners search, book and buy from every regional ○○ON instance in the country in one place.
- A single keyword (ginseng, kimchi) brings up the related regions, festivals, small businesses, lodging and experiences together. It opens an overseas purchasing pipeline for regional products and services so that local farms and shops export directly.
- A global super-app is not a short-term goal but a long-term direction for expansion after the domestic region-owned model has been verified. Overseas expansion means a regional OS + operating staff for emerging economies — exporting not only the platform but also the people who build and run it and the methods they use.
Chapter 8. Intellectual Property and Legal Framework
8-3Clauses protecting local governments
- Joint ownership of patents and trademarks by local governments is excluded and a free licence is granted (to prevent a repeat of the Incheon Metropolitan City case).
- Stated in the agreement — deadline for handing over data in a standard format, local government copy of source code, settings and documents, takeover test by a replacement operator (Chapter 4, 4-4)
Chapter 9. Rules for Revising the White Paper
9-1Document system
| Document | Role | Revision cycle |
|---|---|---|
| Master White Paper (this document) | 10-year principles — scope of standardisation, governance, adoption standard, people, economic structure, expansion, intellectual property | Once a year or when a principle changes |
| Business Logic Framework reference edition | The single source for figures, sources, schedules, unconfirmed matters, prohibited expressions and terminology | Revision proposals reflected weekly |
| Proposal to the Ministry of the Interior and Safety | Project proposal to central government — 4 platforms + 2 execution systems, 12-month pilot | Before submission |
| Adoption proposals for each city and county | Settings-injection proposals in which only the region name and figures are replaced | Per region |
| A to Z Comprehensive Guide and Execution Plan | Internal execution procedures, monthly execution table, risk management | Quarterly |
| CHARTER · 6 rule files · CLA | Organisational operating rules | Periodic operation (rule files are owned by headquarters; regions use copies) |
9-4Revision history
| Edition | Date | Changes |
|---|---|---|
| v1 | 12 October 2026 | First draft — integrated the Business Logic Framework reference edition, the proposal to the Ministry of the Interior and Safety, the comprehensive guide, the governance design and the budget map |
| v2 | 12 October 2026 | Reflected 12 external review comments — strengthened contradiction decisions, moat, ontology specification, architecture decisions, AI layer, decision rules and verification criteria |
| v2.1 | 12 October 2026 | Reflected 2nd and 3rd reviews — ownership chain, separation of authority, judgement bands, hosting route, confirmation of headquarters as a for-profit company, expansion population fixed at 243, cleanup of prohibited expressions and typos |
This Public Edition contains only the chapters on principles. The full edition, including the economic structure, internal procedures and items under review, is provided during adoption discussions. The Korean edition is the authoritative text.
Cite as: LocalON OS Master White Paper, Public Edition v2.1 (12 October 2026), openkorea.co.kr/en/whitepaper/v2.1/