SKT, Facebook to launch telecom startup incubator in Korea

SK Telecom CTO and corporate R&D center head Choi Jin-sung speaks during a summit of the Telecom Infra Project at Facebook headquarters in Silicon Valley in the United States, Wednesday. / Courtesy of SK Telecom

By Yoon Sung-won

SK Telecom will jointly establish a Facebook Campus, the world’s first telecom infrastructure startup incubation center, in Korea with the world’s largest social networking service (SNS) provider, the company announced Thursday.

The nation’s largest telecom company said Facebook’s decision to choose Korea as the first location for its telecom infrastructure startup incubation project came because it acknowledges the country’s high potential in telecom technology research and development (R&D). The company expects that the incubation center will boost the profile of startups in the telecom technology sector, which has been inclined toward mobile application development and smartphone-related technologies.

“Facebook’s decision to open the campus in Korea reflects global recognition of the country’s achievements in telecom technologies,” said Choi Jin-sung, CTO of SK Telecom and head of its corporate R&D center. “We will continue to push for telecom infrastructure innovation in the future.”

SK Telecom and Facebook held a summit of the Telecom Infrastructure Project (TIP) at the latter’s headquarters in Silicon Valley at which they decided to establish the startup incubation center in the first quarter of next year. TIP was founded in February under the leadership of Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg to research fast and efficient fifth-generation (5G) network technologies and help developing countries improve telecom accessibility. Choi has been named the first chairman of TIP.

By operating the incubation center, Facebook will seek out promising telecom infrastructure startups here and help them attract investment from venture capitals in Silicon Valley. SK Telecom will offer workspace, business infrastructure, technology development support and mentoring to the startups.

During the summit, TIP set a goal to encourage the startups to push for development of technologies that can be applied to current networks quickly and easily, aiming at vitalizing innovation in the telecom sector. Member companies of TIP agreed to consider introducing the technologies developed by the startups to their commercial networks.

In general, new telecom technologies and network equipment are introduced by enterprises after years of testing. But many startups lack the financial background to survive this period. SK Telecom expects that such fostering measures will help startups record fast and sustainable business growth.

TIP and Facebook will build more startup incubation centers in other countries to speed up innovation in the telecom sector.