SKT, Kakao to cooperate in AI, ESG, intellectual property

Kakao CEO Yeo Min-soo, left, bumps fists with SK Telecom's head of mobile network operator business Yoo Young-sang after the two companies partnered to cooperate in AI, ESG and intellectual property at Kakao's office in Pangyo, south of Seoul. / Courtesy of SK Telecom

By Kim Bo-eun

SK Telecom and Kakao unveiled a partnership Sunday to co-develop technology in artificial intelligence (AI) and create a fund for environmental, social and governance (ESG) policies. The companies have also agreed to share intellectual property and open this up to small- and medium-sized companies and venture firms.

The telecom carrier and tech giant plan to develop AI technology in the sectors of infrastructure, data and language models. Language models, which assign probability to a piece of unseen text based on training data, are vital for tasks such as speech recognition, spelling correction and machine translation.

AI learning data such as in the forms of text, voice and images will be shared in the process of developing technology. The companies are seeking to open up new AI technology to academia as well as startups.

They are also setting up an ESG fund to assist innovative ICT companies with related policies. The fund will likely be managed by Kakao Ventures, the group's venture capital unit. The ESG fund will assist firms, such as those making profits from recycling plastic.

SK Telecom and Kakao also plan to share intellectual property and make them available to SMEs and venture startups as well.

They will set up an intellectual property pool in future business areas such as AI, platforms and media, seeking to minimize related disputes.

SKT has opened 2,597 patents in the past five years in a program with the Korea Invention Promotion Association and the Korea Institute for the Advancement of Technology. Among them, 130 were transferred to the businesses at their request, free of charge. Kakao has also continued to assist startups via investments and acquisitions.

The two entities formed a strategic partnership in 2019, exchanging 300 billion won worth of shares. Since then, they have been operating a "synergy team," in which executives of each company are taking part.

Based on their partnership, SK Telecom and Kakao created an AI R&D body with Samsung Electronics in December. The three companies plan to unveil AI technology to be utilized in the fight against the COVID-19 pandemic within the first half of this year. The AI technology enables users to identify the level of virus infection risk at a certain location, suggesting alternative routes or advising social distancing.

"We will secure the world's best AI technology and use this to resolve societal challenges," SK Telecom's head of mobile network operator business Yoo Young-sang said in a press statement.

Kakao CEO Yeo Min-soo said, "We believe it is meaningful for two big tech firms to share core assets relating to AI, ESG and intellectual property.”