KT and SK Telecom, two giant players in the telecom industry, are expected to go head-to-head with each other to take the initiative in the wired and wireless integrated service market at the beginning of the year. According to the industry on Jan. 5, KT and SK Telecom are poised to wage an all-out war to secure 2.3㎓ band frequency and satellite DAB business rights since the wired and wireless integration and the convergence of telecommunications and broadcasting are expected to emerge as the biggest issues in the telecom industry this year.
The two telecom operators are likely to engage in a life-and-death struggle to acquire frequencies of 2.3㎓ and 5㎓, in that those frequencies would particularly play the role of setting the direction of their future business.
First of all, they are expected to collide each other in a competition to secure the frequency of 2.3㎓. KT declares that it would muster all of its corporate capabilities to acquire the frequency, which is essential for its advance into the fixed line-based mobile business. The telecom operator thinks that SKT’s satellite DAB business would be ultimately in the way of its high-speed mobile Internet business and the rival company intends to incapacitate the business by securing the frequency.
KT already selected 15 in-house experts and newly established ‘Next-Generation Mobile Team’ within Business Support Unit. Furthermore, it is going to submit a joint recommendation to ask the government to allocate the frequency earlier than scheduled, keeping pace with other fixed line telecom operators, this week.
KT judges that even though 2.3㎓ is originally a frequency for a fixed line telecom carrier, SKT is using delaying tactics to acquire the frequency by prescribing it for the wireless Internet.
Thus, KT plans to logically respond to SKT. KT argues that as a matter of fact, SK Telecom secured the frequency (25㎒) in 2.630 ~2.655㎓ band related with satellite DAB by using its stake in MBCO of Japan and that if even 2.3㎓ is allocated to SKT as the frequency for the mobile Internet, it is tantamount to permitting a specific service provider to monopolize frequencies.
SK Telecom has a strategy of first driving forward a high-speed mobile Internet business using the satellite DAB business, even though it sees that it requires to secure the 2.3㎓ band frequency to do the wired and wireless integrated business.
To that end, SKT is accelerating the commercialization of the satellite DAB business. It plans to preoccupy the high-speed wireless Internet service market by using the 2.630 ~ 2.655㎓ frequencies. In the mobile area, it intends to overcome the limit of its multimedia service by utilizing a ‘Gap Filler’ repeater and furthermore, seeks the linkage with finance and home network as well.
Moreover, SKT plans to offer an integrated service of telecommunications and broadcasting by implementing an integrated multimedia service enabling not only mobile phone functions through an integrated personal mobile terminal but also audio broadcasting, real-time moving picture, and two-way data communications.
Furthermore, it aims at holding sway over the mobile environment, expanding its mobile Internet service to the fixed line area, in which, according to company officials, it has more leeway than KT, by securing the 2.3㎓ frequency.
"In the high-speed mobile Internet business, KT puts forward wireless LAN (hotspot). On the other hand, SKT seeks preoccupying the market by using satellite DAB," said one source of the industry. "But ultimately, for the wired and wireless integrated business, acquiring frequencies is a must. In this sense, the two companies will have no choice but to be locked in a cut-throat competition to secure either 2.3㎓ band for the wireless Internet or the 2.630 ~ 2.655㎒ band for satellite DAB."