A week in telecoms: SK Telecom and Reliance Jio advance AI strategies

Reliance Jio expands AI ambition

Fast-growing disruptor Reliance Jio has big ambitions for AI in India, which were revealed at Reliance Industries’ recent Annual General Meeting (AGM).

Jio aspires to “democratize” AI through its “AI Everywhere for Everyone” strategy, by “offering powerful AI models and services to everyone in India at the most affordable prices,” said Reliance Industries Chairman Mukesh Ambani, speaking at the AGM.

To achieve that goal, the operator plans to build Gigawatt, “AI-ready” data centers in Jamnagar that will be powered by green energy from Reliance and create “AI inference facilities” across the country that can be scaled up with demand. Ambani also said the operator will partner with global tech companies to bring “the most advanced AI models, solutions and tools to India.”

“By leveraging our expertise in infrastructure, networking, operations, software, and data and by collaborating with our global partners, our goal is to create the world's lowest AI inferencing cost, right here in India. This will make AI applications in India more affordable than anywhere else, making AI accessible to all,” said Ambani.

As a first step to putting AI tools into everyone’s hands, Jio announced an AI-Cloud Welcome offer of 100 GB of free cloud storage, starting at the end of October. By incentivizing customers with enough capacity to store data, videos, photos and any digital content for free, Jio expects they will benefit from AI-powered intelligent services.

Another prong in the AI strategy is Jio Brain, the operator’s suite of tools and platforms across the AI lifecycle.

Ambani said that Jio is “embedding AI into all our processes and offerings, creating end-to-end workflows with real-time, data-driven insights and automation,” and that this adoption is accelerated by Jio Brain.

Jio Brain has been implemented in other Reliance operating companies to fast-track AI transformations as well, he said.

Building on the experience within Reliance, Ambani said he expects the Jio Brain service platform to be offered to other enterprises, but he did not provide a timeframe for when that could happen.

SKT deepens AI ties with Perplexity

SK Telecom, which aims to become an AI company, has announced plans to work with Gen AI conversational search engine specialist Perplexity to develop Personal AI Agents (PAA) for South Korea and international markets. The pair plan to launch a beta PAA in the U.S. “within the year.”

The move deepens their relationship since SKT invested $10 million in U.S.-based Perplexity in June, as TelecomTV reported.

With the latest development, Perplexity has agreed to invest in SKT’s Silicon Valley-based subsidiary Global AI Platform Corporation (GAP Co.) as part of a business and technology cooperation. GAP Co. is working on the development of PAAs for international markets.

Furthermore, SKT said it has also “revamped” its own PAA A. (Adot) to include Perplexity’s AI search engine, which now sits alongside multi-large language models (LLMs) ChapGPT, Claude and AdotX. The operator will work with Perplexity to jointly develop an AI search engine that is optimized for South Korea to improve the Adot service.

SKT said it had more than 5 million Adot subscribers as of the end of August, up from 3.2 million at the end of last year.

In addition to Perplexity, SKT’s current AI-related investments and partnerships include Antrhopic, Lambda and Smart Global Holdings.

EE launches 5G SA and Wi-Fi 7

EE has switched on 5G standalone (SA) in 15 UK cities and introduced a suite of new home routers based on WiFi 7, in the latest upgrade aimed at improving connectivity “in and out of the home.”

The news will be a welcome sign for the mobile sector as the slow pace of 5G SA rollouts around the world have long been a source of frustration. According to Ericsson’s latest Mobility Report, 320 operators offer commercial 5G services but just 60 have deployed or launched 5G SA.  

The operator has made the service available in Bath, Belfast, Birmingham, Bradford, Bristol, Cardiff, Edinburgh, Glasgow, Hull, Leeds, Leicester, Liverpool, London, Manchester and Sheffield. Although limited to 15 cities, EE has installed 5G SA on 75% of base stations in each location, which takes coverage to 95% of these areas. 

EE is bringing up the rear with 5G SA in the UK, trailing rivals Vodafone, which introduced the technology in June 2023, and Virgin Media O2, which launched in February 2024. 

Coupled with the 5G SA launch, EE also unveiled home routers based on Wi-Fi 7 technology from partner Qualcomm. The faster routers, which can deliver “gigabit Wi-Fi”, will be available to customer subscribing to full-fibre packages initially and available as an add-on to existing plans in the next few weeks. 

Marc Allera, CEO of EE said: “Today, EE is launching UK firsts in network capabilities designed to unleash the huge potential of a wave of AI powered devices. Together, these new technologies bring EE customers the best networks in and out of the home.”

Telia simplifies operations, trims workforce in efficiency drive

Telia Company announced plans to cut 3,000 jobs this year as part of a new operating model designed to streamline processes and simplify operations.

The operator group, which has operations in Estonia, Finland, Lithuania, Norway and Sweden, wants to strengthen its local business units and remove operational inefficiencies by decentralizing some corporate functions.

Capabilities from Telia’s Common Products & Services and Group Strategy & Commercial organizations will be transferred to the local operators in each market. This will enable each operator “to better serve customers and capture growth based on local market needs, while reducing overlaps and simplifying interfaces in day-to-day operations,” according to Telia’s announcement.

Some functions will remain centralized, housed in the “common technology and product unit”, namely, IT, networks and product management.

The structural changes are intended to create “a more customer-focused organisation” and result in “faster decision-making and commercial execution,” the operator said.

“This is a tough decision, but one that is necessary to ensure the long-term success of Telia. Together with the Board and my leadership team, we are set to eliminate barriers to execution and reduce layers of organizational complexity so that we can better serve our customer,” said Patrik Hofbauer, President and CEO of Telia Company.

The workforce reduction, subject to union negotiations, will affect each of Telia’s five markets but most of the job losses will be in Sweden. The program is expected to result in annual savings of at least SEK 2.6 billion ($253 million), but the operator will be hit by restructuring charges of SEK 1.4 billion in the second half of 2024.

Telefónica demos holographic calls on smartphones

In one of the more futuristic announcements this week, Telefónica, Ericsson and MATSUKO demonstrated the integration of holographic calls into smartphone dialers using the IP Multimedia Subsystem (IMS) Data Channel standard.

The Proof-of-Concept is part of the 6G-XR European research project and it showed the potential for immersive communication. In the PoC, users can make holographic calls from the dialer of compatible smartphones, including the Samsung Galaxy S series.

Telefónica provided the PoC coordination and service; Ericsson, the IMS infrastructure; and MATSUKO, the holographic technology and applications for viewer and presenter.

The trio demonstrated the transmission of a one-way hologram (from presenter to viewer) with two-way audio between them.

But there is more work to be done on the technology and standards before this futuristic communication is a reality. 3GPP specifications for IMS Data Channel do not have standard interfaces with third parties, which makes implementation difficult. Furthermore, it is technically challenging to synchronize audio and holographic video. The companies said they will continue to address these issues while working to improve the quality and experience of holographic calls.

In other news:

• AT&T has signed a multi-year agreement with Nokia to support its future fiber network footprint, which passed 27.8 million total fiber locations as of the second quarter of 2024.
• Softbank announced it will launch Eutelsat Group’s OneWeb low earth orbit (LEO) satellite connectivity services in December this year, describing it as a milestone in its strategy to build a “Ubiquitous Network” that combines ground-based terrestrial networks and non-terrestrial network (NTN) solutions, including satellite- and stratospheric HAPS-based platforms.