- Joint Venture Company to develop Large Language Models (LLM)
specifically for telecommunications companies
- Joint Venture Company to be established within this year
- Initial fine-tuning of models takes place
BARCELONA, Spain, Feb. 26,
2024 /PRNewswire/ -- SK Telecom (NYSE:SKM, "SKT"),
Deutsche Telekom, e& Group, Singtel and SoftBank Corp. today
held the inaugural meeting of the Global Telco AI Alliance (GTAA)
at MWC Barcelona 2024 and announced their plans to establish a
joint venture.
The meeting was attended by SK's Chairman Chey Tae-won, SKT's CEO Ryu Young-sang, Deutsche Telekom's CEO
Tim Höttges and DT's Board Member
for Technology & Innovation, Claudia
Nemat, e& Group's Group CEO Hatem Dowidar, Singtel Group's CEO Yuen Kuan
Moon, and SoftBank's CISO Tadashi Iida.
Through the Joint Venture Company, the five companies plan to
develop Large Language Models (LLMs) specifically tailored to the
needs of telecommunications companies (telcos). The LLMs will be
designed to help telcos improve their customer interactions via
digital assistants and chatbots.
The goal is to develop multilingual LLMs optimized for languages
including Korean, English, German, Arabic and Japanese, with plans
for additional languages to be agreed among the founding
members.
The joint venture plans to focus on deploying innovative AI
applications tailored to the needs of the Global AI Telco Alliance
members in their respective markets, enabling them to reach a
global customer base of approximately 1.3 billion across 50
countries. Deutsche Telekom boasts about 250 million subscribers
across 12 countries, including Germany and the U.S. The e& Group has 169
million subscribers in 16 countries across the Middle East, Asia, and Africa, while the Singtel Group has 770
million subscribers in 21 countries, including Australia, India, and Indonesia.
The Joint Venture Company will be established within this year.
Compared to general LLMs, telco-specific LLMs are more attuned
to the telecommunications domain and better at understanding user
intent. By making it easier for telcos to deploy high-quality
generative AI models swiftly and efficiently, telco-specific LLMs
are expected to help accelerate AI transformation of various telco
business and services, including customer service.
The LLMs are currently being optimized. Telcos' customer service
data is used to fine-tune the model for telco-specific questions.
This is because tariff and contract models, information on special
hardware such as the router, for example (e.g. How do I do a
reset?) are rarely found in the general training data of the large
models. But it's exactly this content that a telco bot needs to
know. So that it is able to understand, summarize and respond to
these specific concerns.
This targeted training ensures the LLM understands the unique
language and needs of telecom operators, paving the way for
enhanced, personalized, and efficient customer
experiences.
"We as telcos need to develop tailored LLM for the telco
industry to make telco operations more efficient, which is a
low-hanging fruit. Our ultimate goal is to discover new business
models by redefining relationships with customers. The Global Telco
AI Alliance brings synergy to its members by allowing them to
achieve more by working as a team," said Ryu Young-sang, CEO of SKT.
"We want our customers to experience the best possible service.
AI helps us do that. Already today, more than 100,000 customer
service dialogs a month in Germany
are handled by Generative AI. By integrating telco-specific large
language models, our 'Frag Magenta' chatbot becomes even more
human-centric: AI personalizes conversations between customers and
chatbots. And our joint venture brings Europe and Asia closer together," said Claudia Nemat, Board Member Deutsche Telekom for
Technology and Innovation.
"This is a monumental step for e& and for the Telco industry
at large. From streamlining customer support interactions to
enabling personalised recommendations, this multi-lingual LLM will
revolutionise how businesses engage with customers", said
Dena Almansoori, Group Chief AI and
Data Officer, e& group. "In collaboration with our Global AI
Telco Alliance partners, we look forward to shaping both the
present and future of customer engagement and setting new standards
for efficiency and innovation across the telecommunications
landscape to better serve our customers and create meaningful
impact."
"This promises to be a game changer not just for us at Singtel
but for any telecom company out there looking to lift their
customer experience beyond limited automated responses and generic
chatbot interactions. This multi-lingual LLM tailored for telcos
will greatly expand chatbot capabilities with relevant responses to
customers' technical queries, freeing up service agents to deal
with more complex customer issues and we intend to deploy this
across the Singtel Group. With leading telcos from three different
continents working on this innovative model, this unprecedented
effort to scale AI development for the telecom industry would not
have been possible had we all decided to go it alone," said Yuen
Kuan Moon, Group Chief Executive Officer, Singtel.
"Through a powerful alliance with industry leaders, we embark on
a mission to revolutionize global communication, elevate service
quality, and ignite a new era of technological innovation powered
by AI. Together, we have the power to shape the future of
telecommunications, empowering communities worldwide with seamless
connectivity and boundless opportunities," said Hideyuki Tsukuda, Executive Vice President &
CTO of SoftBank Corp.
About SK Telecom
SK Telecom has been leading the growth of the mobile industry
since 1984. Now, it is taking customer experience to new heights by
extending beyond connectivity. By placing AI at the core of its
business, SK Telecom is rapidly transforming into an AI company
with a strong global presence. It is focusing on driving
innovations in areas of AI Infrastructure, AI Transformation (AIX)
and AI Service to deliver greater value for industry, society, and
life.
For more information, please contact skt_press@sk.com or visit
our LinkedIn page www.linkedin.com/company/sk-telecom.
About Deutsche Telekom:
https://www.telekom.com/konzernprofil
About e&
e& is one of the leading technology groups in the world.
Boasting impressive financial figures for 2023, with consolidated
net revenue reaching a staggering AED 53.8 billion and consolidated
net profit surging to AED 10.3 billion, the Group's impeccable
credit ratings reflect its strong balance sheet and track record of
sustained success.
Founded in Abu Dhabi over 48
years ago, the Group has a rich legacy as the pioneer in
telecommunications in the UAE. Today, its footprint spans 16
countries across the Middle East,
Asia, and Africa, making it a leading player in the
industry.
Innovation is ingrained in e&'s DNA to create an unbreakable
bond between communities using cutting-edge digital solutions,
smart connectivity and advanced technologies.
The Group has designed five strong business pillars that address
various customer segments: e& UAE, e& international, e&
life, e& enterprise and e& capital. Through these pillars,
we strive to revolutionise the way people communicate, work and
live by providing unparalleled services and exceptional
experiences.
At e&, we are committed to pushing the boundaries of what is
possible and delivering measurable results that make a difference
in people's lives.
To learn more about e&, please visit: https://eand.com/
About Singtel
Singtel is Asia's leading
communications technology group, providing a portfolio of services
from next-generation communication, 5G and technology services to
infotainment to both consumers and businesses. The Group has
presence in Asia, Australia and Africa and reaches over 770 million mobile
customers in 21 countries. Its infrastructure and technology
services for businesses span 21 countries, with more than 428
direct points of presence in 362 cities.
For consumers, Singtel delivers a complete and integrated suite
of services, including mobile, broadband and TV. For businesses,
Singtel offers a complementary array of workforce mobility
solutions, data hosting, cloud, network infrastructure, analytics
and cyber security capabilities.
Singtel is dedicated to continuous innovation, harnessing
technology to create new and exciting customer experiences and
shape a more sustainable, digital future.
About SoftBank
Guided by the SoftBank Group's corporate philosophy,
"Information Revolution – Happiness for everyone," SoftBank Corp.
(TOKYO: 9434) operates
telecommunications and IT businesses in Japan and globally. SoftBank Corp. has 40
million mobile subscribers in Japan, and through its group companies, 61
million smartphone payment (PayPay) users, 85 million online media
(Yahoo! JAPAN) users and 96
million communication app (LINE) users (as of February 7, 2024). Building on its strong
business foundation and compelling number of customer touchpoints,
SoftBank Corp. is expanding into non-telecom fields in line with
its "Beyond Carrier" growth strategy while further growing its
telecom business. Also, by fully harnessing the power of AI, 5G/6G,
IoT, Digital Twin, Non-Terrestrial Network (NTN) solutions,
including High Altitude Platform Station (HAPS)-based stratospheric
telecommunications, and other advanced technologies, SoftBank Corp.
aims to be "a company that provides next-generation social
infrastructure essential to the development of a digital society."
To learn more, please visit https://www.softbank.jp/en/
View original content to download
multimedia:https://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/skt-deutsche-telekom-e-singtel-and-softbank-corp-announce-plan-to-establish-a-joint-venture-302071011.html
SOURCE SK Telecom