KT CEO Kim Young-shub says will accelerate AI partnership with Microsoft

SEOUL, March 5 (Yonhap) -- Kim Young-shub, chief executive officer (CEO) of KT Corp., a major South Korean mobile carrier, said Wednesday he will strengthen the company's artificial intelligence (AI) partnership with Microsoft Corp. to deliver tangible results within the year.

"I will accelerate efforts to achieve concrete outcomes with Microsoft this year," Kim said at a press conference during the ongoing Mobile World Congress (MWC) 2025 in Barcelona, Spain.

Last year, KT and Microsoft signed a five-year partnership agreement to invest a combined 2.4 trillion won (US$1.65 billion) to jointly advance AI technologies, including developing new AI models tailored to Korean language and culture, as well as new cloud services catering to the needs of Korean corporate customers.

Through this initiative, KT aims to increase AI-driven revenue to 12 percent of its overall sales this year.

As a first step, an AI transformation (AX) strategic fund, created to expand the AX ecosystem in South Korea under the partnership with Microsoft, will begin operations in the first quarter.

A joint innovation center for AI and cloud research will open in the third quarter.

Moreover, KT plans to unveil a Korean-style AI model leveraging Open AI's GPT 4o in the second quarter.

The Koreanized AI model, which is being co-developed by KT and Microsoft, is designed to better understand Korean language, knowledge and culture, complementing English-based ChatGPT and offering localized solutions that cater to Korean users and businesses.

CEO Kim reaffirmed his vision of transforming the company into an "AICT" company, a fusion of AI, telecommunications, and information and communications technology (ICT).

"KT's key slogan will be the complete transformation into an AICT company from this year," he said. "We will drive innovation across all areas."

brk@yna.co.kr
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