November 27, 2024

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SK Group Chairman Chey Tae-won delivers a keynote speech during the Global Telco AI Alliance CEO Summit held in a Seoul hotel on Thursday. (SK Telecom)

Led by South Korea’s SK Telecom, a new global alliance has been formed as four major telecommunications firms from South Korea, Germany, the United Arab Emirates and Singapore join hands to expand cooperation in the artificial intelligence business.

The nation’s No. 1 telecom company in terms of subscriptions said Thursday that it hosted the Global Telco AI Alliance CEO Summit, a hybrid event held both online and offline, in Seoul and gathered key executives of Deutsche Telekom, e& and Singtel earlier in the day.

The key attendees of the event include: SK Group Chairman Chey Tae-won, SK Telecom CEO Ryu Young-sang, Deutsche Telekom board member Claudia Nemat, who is responsible for technology and innovation, e& group CEO Hatem Dowidar and Singtel group CEO Yuen Kuan Moon.

At Thursday’s event, the four companies also launched the alliance, Global Telco AI alliance, and signed a memorandum of understanding to make joint efforts to accelerate the AI transformation of the telecom business and develop new growth engines through new AI-powered business models.

The SK chairman congratulated the alliance on its launch and stressed the importance of the four firms joining hands to transform into AI companies that provide a new and innovative communication experience to their customers.

The launch of the Global Telco AI alliance was driven by a consensus that it is difficult to survive without AI-based change and innovation as global competition intensifies with the advent of generative AIs.

According to a report titled “Economic potential of generative AI," published by the global consulting firm McKinsey & Co. last month, generative AI has the potential to create $4.4 trillion worth of value annually across 63 use cases.

The four companies also agreed on the need to join forces, as being flexible in responding to the digital transformation is difficult in the rapidly changing industrial environment, which is characterized by platform linkage, business model expansion and system automation.

They also said they believe now is the right time to shift the paradigm of the traditional telecommunications industry through AI since existing key businesses such as wired and wireless telecommunications and media have to be transformed with AI to secure new growth engines.

Under the partnership, they agreed jointly to develop an AI platform by combining their technologies and capabilities. SK Telecom said it is expecting the Global Telco AI Alliance to play a central role in planning new AI services including the joint construction of a large language model for developing AI agents for each firm.

Through the alliance, each telecom company will likely focus on localizing and enhancing AI services on a common platform without spending time and money on developing large platforms separately to increase customer value. They may even launch a generative AI-based super-app faster to provide their services to global customers, the SK Telecom officials said.

The alliance will also form a Global Telco AI Alliance joint working group to have detailed discussions on issues such as co-investment opportunities and the co-development of the alliance's platform to reach a definitive agreement. The four firms are also planning to support each other in operating AI services and apps in their respective markets and cooperating to build an ecosystem.

“The launch of this alliance is meaningful in that it has prepared a starting point for a new journey to innovate business models while growing together with global partners,” SK Telecom CEO said. “We will become a game changer that leads the expansion of the global AI ecosystem, such as providing new experiences and values ​​to customers through AI transformation in all industries.”

Deutsche Telekom board member said, "I am particularly pleased that this alliance also stands for bridging the gap between Europe and Asia and that we are jointly pursuing an open-vendor approach. Depending on the application, we can use the best technology. The founding of this alliance is an important milestone for our industry.”

By Jie Ye-eun (yeeun@heraldcorp.com)