Mobile service provider SK Telecom has revealed its financial result and key achievements for the second quarter of 2024.
SK Telecom posted revenue of KRW 4.4224 trillion (up 2.7 percent), operating income of KRW 537.5 billion (up 16 percent), and net income of KRW 350.2 billion.
SK Telecom has achieved higher performance in the mobile and fixed telecom business in April-June. SK Telecom’s enterprise business revenue grew 11 percent to KRW 434.2 billion, fueled by higher data center utilization and increased cloud orders.
SK Telecom says it lowered its capital expenditure (Capex) to KRW 388 billion in Q2 2024 from KRW 826 billion in Q2 2023. SK Telecom made an investment of KRW 317 billion in Q1 2024.
Despite slashing its Capex, SK Telecom says its mobile business has added 16.23 million 5G subscribers by the end of June against 15.93 million in Q1 2024. SK Telecom’s 5G customers represent over 70 percent of the total user base.
SK Telecom has 31.71 million mobile phone customers. Monthly churn in mobile users was 0.8 percent vs 0.9 percent.
SKT also secured 9.6 million pay TV subscribers. The number of pay TV subscribers has reached 9.6 million. The number of broadband subscribers has reached 7.05 million during the second-quarter. The number of IPTV subscribers has reached 6.78 million in April-June. ARPU of SK Telecom has reached 29.29 vs 29.23.
SKT secured its first AI cloud order from domestic internet service providers. The company plans to scale up its AI cloud business significantly.
SKT’s strategy is to build an AI value chain, including the AI Data Center and AI service, and to secure its business competitiveness based on the second quarter’s strong performance. The company has invested more than $300 million since last year to secure a new AI growth engine.
The data center business recorded growth of 20.5 percent in revenue, backed by increase in utilization rate. SKT is investing $200 million in SMART Global Holdings (SGH), a leading developer of enterprise solutions in the U.S.
In the enterprise sector, revenue from the IoT businesses rose 29 percent, and the cloud business grew 28 percent.
“We will enhance profitability and efficiency by consolidating our fixed and wireless businesses performance and will showcase our progress as an AI company in the second half of the year,” said Kim Yang-seob, CFO of SKT.
Baburajan Kizhakedath
