SK Telecom Unveils 'AI Native' Strategy
At MWC Barcelona, SK Telecom's CEO unveiled a company-wide 'AI Native' strategy, prioritizing a major overhaul of its systems and infrastructure around artificial intelligence. The move signals a deep pivot by a major global telco to embed AI into its core operations, from network management to customer-facing products.
This "AI Native" strategy is the culmination of a multi-year pivot for SK Telecom. CEO Ryu Young-sang first announced a vision to become an "AI Company" back in 2022, aiming to redefine its core telecommunications business with AI and achieve a corporate value of over KRW 40 trillion by 2026. The company has since launched AI services like the "A." personal assistant and has been integrating AI to create an "AI MNO" (Mobile Network Operator). The strategy is built on what SKT calls the "AI Pyramid," focusing on three layers: AI Infrastructure, AI Transformation (AIX), and AI Service. For infrastructure, the company is developing its own AI chips through its arm, Sapeon, and plans to nearly double its data center capacity by 2030. This includes building 1GW-class hyperscale AI data centers across Korea, with the goal of making the nation an AI hub for Asia. A key part of the infrastructure plan involves a partnership with OpenAI to build an AI data center in Korea as part of the "Stargate Korea" project. This collaboration will see SK hynix, another SK Group company, supply High Bandwidth Memory (HBM) for the project. SK Telecom is also working with NVIDIA and Amazon Web Services (AWS) to advance its Edge AI and AI-RAN (Radio Access Network) technologies. To accelerate this transformation, SKT has consolidated its AI capabilities into a new in-house company, "AI CIC," with a planned investment of approximately 5 trillion Korean won ($3.5 billion) over the next five years. The goal is to generate at least the same amount in annual AI revenues by 2030. Internally, the company is deploying an enterprise AI agent, A-dot Biz, to 80,000 employees across 25 group companies to improve efficiency. The network itself is being redesigned for the AI era under a 6G strategy called ATHENA (AI-native, Trust, Hyper-connectivity, Experience, opeN, Agility). This involves two parallel tracks: "AI for network" for autonomous optimization and "network for AI" to efficiently support AI-driven services. A "Zero Trust" security framework will be implemented across all systems to enhance security. On the customer-facing side, SKT is using AI to overhaul its contact centers and personalize services. By leveraging large language models (LLMs) from companies like Anthropic, SKT has improved the quality of responses from its customer service agents. The company is also developing "AI Personas" to better understand customer behavior and an "A. phone" that will act as a personal AI agent. This AI pivot is also a global effort. SK Telecom is a founding member of the Global Telco AI Alliance, alongside Deutsche Telekom, e&, and Singtel, with Softbank later joining. The alliance is co-developing a Telco AI Platform and LLMs specifically trained for the telecommunications industry to improve customer interactions through digital assistants and chatbots. This aggressive AI strategy comes as SK Telecom navigates a challenging period, including a significant drop in net income in fiscal year 2025 following a cybersecurity breach. The company's leadership is betting on AI-driven businesses, particularly its AI data center (AIDC) revenue which has seen double-digit growth, to drive future earnings.
