AI Makes Daily Publishing Possible | MK AX
- SmileShark Team
- 3 hours ago
- 5 min read
AI Automation finally allowed us to focus on the work that truly requires human judgment.
- Yoo Young-hoon Head of AI TF, MK AX
[ 💡 Key Results ]
1. Daily content publishing - Reduced an expected 2-3 day podcast workflow to an automated 7 AM daily release
2. Significant resource savings - Multi-step manual editing reduced to final review only
3. Launched Korea's first conversational AI news podcast by a media company
About MK AX
Company Mk AX Co.,Ltd
Business News・Internet financial information services
Founded October 1999 Website https://www.mk.co.kr
MK AX is a digital innovation subsidiary of Maeil Business Newspaper, Korea’s leading economic newspaper. Leveraging Maeil Business Media’s extensive news, data, and broadcast assets, MK AX delivers Korea’s leading economic information services.
Recently, Maeil Business Media established an AI Task Force to accelerate its AI Transformation(AX) strategy. The MAI Morning Briefing project became the first major outcome of this company-wide initiative.
Evolving Reader Habits, and a New Way to Deliver News
MK AX had long focused on one central question: "How can we deliver news to readers more effectively?"
As consumption formats diversified — text, video, audio — publishers needed new approaches. The audio market grew rapidly in the 2020s as listeners preferred formats that enabled multitasking.
MK AX had already operated an audio service summarizing key news highlights. However, as the AI TF Lead recalls:
"The entire workflow depends on manual effort — writing scripts, editing broadcast clips, or outsourcing production. Every path required significant resources."
Outsourced conversational podcasts required 2-3 days from planning to recording and editing. The team realized a new approach was needed.
The Turning Point: AI Transformation Begins
In 2024, a major shift occurred—MK AX launched its company-wide AI TF. Among various ideas, one stood out:
“What if we built a fully AI-generated, conversational podcast?”
Around that time, MK AX was introduced to AWS partner SmileShark, and the teams began a joint Proof of Concept(PoC).
SmileShark’s technical expertise and AWS Cloud infrastructure significantly accelerated development, producing results that exceeded initial expectations.
Preventing hallucination was our biggest technical challenge
Q. How did you ensure news accuracy?
A. Preventing hallucination was the top priority. Accuracy is fundamental in news, and any AI-generated content must not introduce information not present in the article. To address this, the team designed a three-stage validation workflow separating fact extraction and style transformation.
Q. What guided your voice technology choice?
A. Because the format was conversational, we needed more natural speech. After reviewing several technologies, ElevenLabs best matched the conversational quality we required. The goal was not simple text-to-speech — listeners needed to feel like two people were actually talking.
A Structured Collaboration from Day One
“This wasn’t just a proof of concept — we aimed to build a system capable of daily operation, and the collaboration reflected that level of completeness.”
MK AX led service design and content planning, while SmileShark handled the AWS-based implementation.
SmileShark translated requirements quickly and focused on practical, operational workflows rather than theoretical models.
Core Technology: Balancing Accuracy and Naturalness
Reliability through hallucination prevention
The system strictly uses only the original article text. Each processing stage includes validation. “Human edits are now rare—occasionally we adjust a phrase, but the base script is accurate enough to use as is.”
Voice Post-Processing for Natural Conversation
To enhance audio quality, the team didn’t simply use raw TTS output. Contextual pauses were inserted, and natural breathing rhythms were added between utterances.
“AI-generated speech can vary in tone from sentence to sentence. It might start calm, then suddenly become intense — causing volume to spike 2-3x. So after assembling all audio segments, we normalize the volume to ensure consistency throughout.”
Serverless was far better than expected
Q. How was the AWS serverless architecture applied?
MK AX initially considered ECS or server-based options, but SmileShark proposed a serverless design. The result was more flexible than expected—easy to modify, easy to extend and ideal for long-term evolution.
Q. What impressed you about AWS Step Functions?
The visual workflow was intuitive for any developer. We could test individual modules—even within a 15-minute end-to-end process—without affecting the rest. This modularity made future expansion far easier.
Automation That Transformed Daily Operations
Category | Before | After | Improvement |
|---|---|---|---|
Production time | 2-3 days | Automated daily at 7 AM | Full automation |
Human Resources | Reporter / External studio | Final review only | ~90% reduction |
Publishing cycle | Irregular | Daily on time | Stable schedule |
Quality consistency | Dependent on producer | Uniform quality | Standardized |
“Employee feedback has been extremely positive. Even other media companies have asked about the service. The consistent daily schedule is especially well received.”
Automation didn’t only reduce effort—it improved the reader experience.
A Fundamental Shift in How the Team Works
The biggest impact was focus. The team moved away from repetitive production tasks and spent more time on planning and high-impact work.
The success also increased confidence—team members became more proactive in exploring AI projects.
Just start small — that’s the best way
Q. Advice for companies considering AI adoption?
You only learn by trying. Start small, test hands-on, and set clear goals—
PoC or full service. Aim for the right level of completeness.
Q. What was the most important factor for the project's success?
Setting clear performance metrics was critical. Rather than trying to change everything at once, we focused on starting small and improving continuously. Most importantly, we kept expectations realistic. AI doesn’t solve every problem, so success depended on defining the roles of people and AI and building a collaboration model around that.
SmileShark is the right partner when quality matters
We highly recommend SmileShark to companies that are newly adopting AWS or considering a serverless architecture. In particular, organizations looking for practical and production-ready AI use cases will find strong value in working with SmileShark.
Their strengths are most evident in projects with clearly defined goals, where execution quality matters as much as speed. SmileShark is an ideal partner for teams seeking fast results while maintaining a stable system from a long-term perspective.
Another key advantage is their continued technical support even after project completion, which helps build a reliable and lasting partnership.
The Journey Continues: Ongoing AI Innovation at MK AX
“SmileShark paved the path. Our job now is to enhance and evolve the service”
“As we’ve said, this isn’t the end — we’re only about halfway there.”
“There’s still a long way to go, but I’m truly grateful for the milestones we’ve achieved together.”
A Realistic Yet Proactive View on AI
“I don’t believe AI will replace everything. But it clearly helps people focus on what truly matters.”
MK AX takes a realistic yet proactive stance on the future of AI. “Through this project, we learned how to collaborate with AI — and we plan to apply it across many more areas.”
Expanding AI Applications
MK AX’s AI journey is just beginning. Building on the success of MAI Morning Briefing, the company plans to expand AI collaboration across more domains — improving script quality, enhancing voice naturalness, and exploring new content formats and topics.
The company also aims to deepen internal AI expertise and build in-house development capabilities. Cross-departmental AI projects are planned to accelerate company-wide AI transformation.
“With SmileShark, AI becomes easier.”
These were Yoo Young-hoon’s closing words. With continued partnership, MK AX’s AI journey continues.
▼ Learn more about MK AX's story featured on the AWS Technical Blog below.
