SK Telecom develops AI-powered 6G air interface

SK Telecom Co., South Korea’s leading mobile carrier, has successfully proved the efficacy of artificial intelligence technology on the improvement of network performance and energy efficiency with global telecom giants, moving a step forward to opening the era of AI-controlled 6G networks.

The company announced on Thursday that it has teamed up with NTT Docomo Inc., NTT Corp. and Nokia to develop the 6G AI-native air interface (AI-AI), the next-generation technology expected to significantly boost network performance while increasing energy efficiency.

The air interface is the specification of the radio transmission between the transmitter and the receiver.

AI-AI is the air interface that enables radios to assess the surrounding environment using machine learning so they can automatically make more efficient use of the available spectrum.

This is considered a key component of 6G networking, and global telecom companies are rushing to develop 6G AI-AI.

SK Telecom said its 6G AI-AI technology improves mobile transmission speed by more than 10% on average.

The four partnering companies will demonstrate the latest result of the 6G AI-AI test at SK Telecom’s booth at the Mobile World Congress in Barcelona, Spain between Feb. 26 and 29.

Since SK Telecom forged a strategic partnership with NTT Docomo in 2022, they have been working together to develop 6G networking technology and establish related global standards.

The four companies will continue to research together the AI-applied mobile network technology in preparation for the 6G networking era, SK Telecom said.

“This milestone represents a significant step forward in collaborative efforts toward the development of 6G core technology involving technology leaders from Korea, Japan, Europe and the United States,” said Yu Takki, vice president and head of Infra Tech at SK Telecom.

“SK Telecom will maintain its momentum in its R&D efforts of applying AI technology to network infrastructure as we move forward to become a global AI company.”

Write to Ji-Eun Jeong at jeong@hankyung.com


Sookyung Seo edited this article.