NI Days Korea 2026 will be held in Seoul on April 10, 2026. This year's event highlights the fact that test and measurement can no longer be explained solely by the performance competition of "one-box equipment." With high-productivity development, shortened project times, demands for automation, and test assets dispersed across multiple labs and lines, the increasing complexity of the field has transformed testing from an issue of equipment into one of systems and operations.

NI summarizes this trend of change in a single sentence: “Software-centric testing.” In an environment where requirements frequently change and test items increase, even for the same measurements, a configurable system is inevitably more efficient than a method of keeping equipment “fixed.” At NI Days, what matters is selecting sessions and booths based on where your organization’s bottlenecks occur, rather than simply looking at “what equipment is available.” The 'demands for viewing' vary depending on whether the bottleneck is test throughput, maintenance of automation development, or operational visualizations such as remediation, assets, and utilization.

Semiconductors: The question that ends the speed debate is 'parallel'

In the semiconductor field, test time is synonymous with competitiveness. However, rather than simply asking "how fast it is," what needs to be verified first is how many measurements can be taken simultaneously. While increasing the number of DUTs in parallel raises throughput, it simultaneously complicates synchronization, timing, and trigger structures, leading to a massive surge in data. If you are looking at the semiconductor track at NI Days, it is practical to ask about system configurations and data processing flows based on "parallel measurement." Questions such as "How is the automation code maintained when the number of channels is increased?" and "How does analysis and reporting continue when the data grows?" directly translate into costs for the field.

Mobility & Batteries: 'Reproducibility' and 'Procedural Automation' Come Before Performance

As electrification becomes an irreversible trend, the ability to repeat the same procedure quickly and without wavering has become more important in mobility testing than a 'perfect single run.' Recipe (procedure) and history management are key to battery testing. Even when using the same equipment, the reliability of the results varies depending on how test conditions, calibration status, and environmental variables are recorded and managed. At NI Days, by evaluating demos based on criteria such as “whether test procedures are version-controlled” and “whether test conditions and equipment status can be recorded together,” one can assess operational quality beyond a simple equipment introduction.

Aerospace & Defense: Rising Importance of HIL/FPGA Verification Driven by Digitalization

Along with digitalization, the aerospace and defense sectors are seeing a growing demand for "verification without actual equipment." The key keywords here are Hardware-in-the-Loop (HIL) and FPGA-based approaches that satisfy real-time requirements. If you look at this track at NI Days, questions such as "how to handle real-time/latency requirements" and "how to respond to open platform and standard interface requirements" are relevant. The key point to watch is not the technology itself, but rather "how to run verification as a system."

Development Workflow: Nigel AI should be viewed as a 'way to reduce time' rather than a 'feature'.

The change that NI is particularly emphasizing this year is NI Nigel™ AI. Nigel AI is introduced as a tool that provides development advice based on LabVIEW knowledge and test system design information, and assists users in creating VIs and projects. In particular, Nigel AI is presented as being integrated into LabVIEW and TestStand to support code writing and sequence configuration tasks.

However, the point to verify on-site is not whether "it works with AI." The key is where our team spends its time. Teams that waste time searching for documentation and examples, teams where writing code itself is the bottleneck, and teams where debugging and review are the bottleneck require different solutions. If you see Nigel AI at the NI Days booth, you must determine who will verify and approve the deliverables proposed by the AI, based on what criteria, and what tasks (review, optimization, and verification) ultimately remain for the engineers to make a decision on adoption. The question must be shifted from “Does AI replace engineers?” to “Where does it return the engineers’ time?”

Operational Workflow: The Value of SystemLink Is 'Visualization', Not 'Server'

As testing spreads across multiple labs and lines, problems arise in operations rather than measurement. When the number of machines grows to hundreds, calibration history management, asset identification, and utilization estimation become disorganized, and even investment decisions rely on a gut feeling of "is it really being used a lot?" SystemLink makes it clear that it provides operational-oriented features to manage assets and calibration data and visualize asset information through dashboards. It also places calibration schedule tracking (alerts) and system utilization monitoring at the forefront.

If you watch SystemLink-related demos at NI Days, it is practical to ask questions such as, “How is calibration history actually collected and tracked?”, “In what units is usage analyzed and used for decision-making?”, and “How is data collected from distributed locations and brought centrally?” The effectiveness of implementation varies significantly depending on whether operational data ends up being merely for 'reporting' or is actually used as input to change test efficiency and quality.

Preview Conclusion: This year's NI Days is an event to check 'trends' rather than 'specifications'.

The atmosphere suggests that NI Days Korea 2026 is being designed not merely as a showcase listing equipment, but as an event that allows for a simultaneous view of test development (automation), test operations (assets, calibration, utilization), and test scaling (system configuration). Consequently, the focus of the viewing experience naturally shifts. Instead of asking "what products are available," the focus should be on "how our organization's bottlenecks can be resolved through this workflow."

Ultimately, the message conveyed by this event is that "testing and measurement are not a matter of equipment, but of engineering productivity that includes software, AI, and data operations."

"NI Days Korea 2026 is an event where attendees can check key topics in the field, such as AI semiconductors, mobility, and aerospace, all in one place. Attendees will be able to gain insights not only through sessions but also by conducting tests firsthand at over 40 booths," said Jeong Gu-hwan, President of NI Korea. For attendees, the primary "purpose of attendance" will be to see how concretely each industry track and demo implements this message at NI Days Korea 2026 on April 10.