Telecoms see AI businesses gain traction in Q2

Telecom companies are beginning to reap the benefits of their investments in artificial intelligence, according to recent data from the second quarter. While traditional telecom services have remained relatively static, AI-related ventures, particularly those focused on AI data centers and cloud services, have seen notable growth.

SK Telecom, a leading player in the industry, experienced the most significant surge in its AI infrastructure business. Its second-quarter revenue increased by just 0.5% compared to the previous year, amounting to 4.3591 trillion won ($3.08 billion). However, the company's operating profit soared by an impressive 67.3% to 566 billion won, a trend partially attributed to the absence of one-off costs from last year's hacking incident.

Despite the overall modest revenue growth, SK Telecom's AI data center business (AIDC) demonstrated remarkable expansion, surging 92.5% year-on-year to 136.2 billion won. This remarkable growth is primarily driven by the expansion of data center operations and the rising demand for high-performance computing infrastructure as the adoption of generative AI accelerates.

To capitalize on this burgeoning market, SK Telecom established a new entity, SK Hyper, late last month to oversee the development and growth of its AIDC business. The company plans to invest a substantial 750 billion won through 2030 to build out an additional 5 gigawatts of AI infrastructure.