SKT to build AI-based network management system in India
SK Telecom will build a nationwide network management system in India, tapping into its artificial intelligence (AI) and big data analysis technologies, the company said Wednesday.
The nation’s largest mobile carrier said its CEO Park Jung-ho met in San Francisco with Sunil Bharti Mittal, chairman of India’s largest telecom company Bharti Airtel, and they have reached an agreement to cooperate not just for the AI-based network management system but also to share expertise in future technologies such as the fifth-generation (5G) network and internet of things (IoT).
Bharti Airtel has over 384.5 million subscribers, and is the world’s No. 3, following China Mobile and Vodafone of the U.K., according to the Global System for Mobile Communication Association.
SK Telecom said the partnership will help it expand its presence i n the global network technology market and allow Bharti Airtel to improve the quality of its mobile network services in a relatively short time.
“SK Telecom will work closely with Bharti Airtel to achieve new network innovations to deliver greater value to its customers,” Park said.
“This partnership will bring a dramatically improved experience to our customers in India by leveraging the expertise of SK Telecom, which has built one of the best mobile broadband networks in the world,” the Bharti Airtel chairman said.
“Strong partnerships have been a hallmark of our growth and we are proud to have always looked ahead to bring the latest technology to India.”
SK Telecom said its AI-based network management system will optimize data traffic and automatically detect and fix network errors around the clock.
SK Telecom has been working on the system with its group affiliate SK C&C, it said.
“Not many telecom companies around the globe have an AI-based network management system. We successfully introduced the system to our own network infrastructure in Korea last October and have received requests from overseas mobile carriers for technology transfer and cooperation,” an SK Telecom official said.
Besides the new system, SK Telecom said it has been providing consulting on network establishment and operation to 11 mobile carriers in nine countries including China and Russia since 2012.
The telecom company will dispatch its network system experts to India to start analyzing the local network environment.
It plans to start testing core features of the new system in the country at the end of this year and complete the project by 2019.