“SK Telecom will be completely transformed with a focus on artificial intelligence (AI). To prevent the telecommunications company from becoming an ‘obsolete industry,’ we have chosen to invest significantly in changing the company,” stated Jaeheon Jeong, president of SK Telecom, during a meeting with journalists at the opening of the Mobile World Congress (MWC) 2026 in Barcelona, Spain. This announcement coincided with the unveiling of SK Telecom’s ‘AI Native’ innovation strategy, which includes plans for substantial investments in AI infrastructure. This appearance marks President Jeong’s first face-to-face interaction with the media since his appointment last November.
Jeong declared that the MWC 2026 presents an opportunity to transform the company entirely. He highlighted that SK Telecom has been a leading company, holding the top spot in market capitalization among Korean firms at one point. He emphasized that the fundamental goal for SK Telecom now should be its perpetual existence, moving away from a reliance on existing telecommunications and subscriber business models to discover new ventures that will sustain the company.
President Jeong warned, “The AI era presents a crisis for companies. Those unable to adapt to AI will be phased out.” He stressed the importance of staying alert amid ever-rising competitors.
To facilitate a significant shift towards becoming an AI company, Jeong announced plans for investments on the trillion-won scale. He stated, “In the AI era, the telecom business will not be a sunset industry but rather a new innovation industry, since all AI operations must be based on networks.” He added, “To seize this opportunity and survive, we’ve decided to make bold investments,” noting that the trillion-won investment has been gradually underway, despite being burdensome now, as it is aimed at pulling future investments into the present. Investments will be evenly spread across network and AI infrastructure.
Emphasizing SK’s core strategy, the ‘AI Full Stack,’ Jeong explained that in building AIDC, land, demand, energy, and ‘chips’ are crucial elements. He noted that SK Group has the member companies capable of fulfilling these roles, positioning it as a potential hub in Asia through its full-stack strategy.
Jeong also expressed confidence in their massive AI model, ‘Aidot X K1,’ featuring 519 billion parameters. He stated, “The focus was on scaling the model to meet specialized demands rather than on the investment amount,” and asserted that outside the U.S., China, and France, SK Telecom is the only company to challenge itself with a model of this scale. SK Telecom aims to export its AI model to countries where sovereign AI models are non-operational.
Jeong unveiled the progress of the ‘manufacturing-focused AI solution business’ in collaboration with Nvidia, SK Hynix, and SK Telecom, where Nvidia is developing the AI model based on its Omnibus platform, SK Telecom is enhancing and implementing the model, and SK Hynix is responsible for uncovering domain-specific needs. This strategy is deemed by SK as the only domain in which it can possess competitive strength in the global market.
Jeong outlined the goal of generating profits through B2B (Business-to-Business) ventures using the manufacturing AI full stack, with the ultimate aim of selling in the global market.