SK Telecom Expands New Game and eSports Business... Establishes Joint Venture in Southeast Asia

Park Jung-ho, President of SK Telecom wearing a T1 uniform, is holding up the contract after signing a joint venture agreement through a video conference with Singtel and AIS.

[Asia Economy Reporter Seulgina Cho] SK Telecom, which is promoting games and e-sports as new businesses, is expanding its business scope to the Asia-Pacific region, including Southeast Asia.

On the 8th, SK Telecom announced that it signed a contract to establish a "game platform joint venture" with Singtel, the No.1 telecom operator in Singapore and Thailand's AIS, targeting 800 million gamers in key Asian regions.

The three companies agreed to invest equal amounts and hold one-third of the shares and rights in the joint venture. The service launch is targeted within this year.

The establishment of this joint venture is a follow-up result of the "e-sports and game joint business" partnership signed by SK Telecom and Singtel in February last year. Following Singtel, which operates in 21 countries worldwide, SK Telecom invited AIS, the largest telecom operator in Thailand, as a business partner to secure a new business outpost in key Asian regions.

Through the joint venture, the three companies will prioritize ▲ specialized communities for gamers ▲ e-sports linked businesses ▲ game media content businesses. Rather than directly developing games, the goal is to provide new platform services beyond gameplay, such as "watching games."

The first service to be promoted is a global game community. The three companies plan to build a specialized community where gamers can interact beyond borders and genres, using it as a hub to expand other linked services.

E-sports, enjoyed by 200 million people worldwide and expected to be a 35 trillion KRW market in 2022, is also a core business area of the joint venture. SK Telecom owns "T1," the world's most popular e-sports team, and Singtel and AIS have steadily expanded the base by hosting e-sports tournaments in their respective countries. The three companies plan to explore various linked businesses leveraging their respective positions within the e-sports industry.

For example, through 5G, it is possible to provide overseas fans with various methods commercialized in Korea, such as virtual reality (VR) live broadcasting of e-sports matches or multi-view broadcasting of multiple pro gamers' perspectives.

Additionally, the three companies will cooperate in the media entertainment field by providing gamers with game media content featuring match videos or pro gamers emerging from games and e-sports.

SK Telecom and others have been preparing this project for a year. Especially after a town hall meeting between SK Telecom and Singtel Group executives in Korea last April, cooperation accelerated rapidly. An SK Telecom official said, "Although the project could have been delayed due to recent external circumstances such as the cancellation of MWC2020, the three companies agreed to overcome the global crisis with advanced ICT and swiftly signed the contract without schedule changes."

To this end, SK Telecom President Park Jung-ho held a CEO meeting of the three companies using a video conferencing solution at his office in T Tower, Euljiro, Seoul on the evening of the 5th and signed the contract. The three companies also agreed to pool efforts to expand the ecosystem by jointly seeking new partners and game developers who can add value to the joint venture.

President Park proposed to the CEOs, "The solution to quickly overcoming the global crisis can be for leading global companies to join forces and revitalize the world economy," and added, "Let us jointly promote wise cooperation utilizing advanced ICT such as 5G and AI to turn this crisis into an opportunity for social evolution."

This content was produced with the assistance of AI translation services.