LIVE FROM MOBILE ASIA EXPO 2014: Korea Telecom (KT) is looking to a range of converged services that make use of its network and platforms to differentiate itself from domestic rivals and drive growth.

CTO Dongmyun Lee told delegates that with high bandwidth mobile broadband and unlimited data plans offered by all three operators in South Korea, this is no longer a differentiator, meaning KT is looking at other areas

“This kind of competition is beginning to weaken our cost structure so we are trying to escape from this vicious circle,” Lee said.

With the use of carrier aggregation and LTE-Advanced, mobile broadband speeds and capacity are now so high, there is scope to use the networks to create new businesses, Lee explained.

KT is using its ‘Giga’ infrastructure to support big data, cloud computing and Internet of Things (IoT) technology to provide converged services around transport, energy, media, integrated safety and life-enhancing care.

The operator has been running a remote energy monitoring service for three years (now covering 12 locations) and is even providing access to cloud infrastructure to support genome analysis.

Lee acknowledged these services depend on cloud and IoT capability and so KT is continuously working with partner companies to develop these technologies.

With huge bandwidth available, KT is also looking at virtualising its network using software defined networking (SDN) and network function virtualisation (NFV). One potential use is to provide dedicated in-building mobile coverage for business customers, something that is currently being trialled.