"3 to 4 out of 10 Use" SKT's AI Consultation Service Surpasses 1.5 Million Monthly Uses

[Asia Economy Reporter Seulgina Cho] SK Telecom announced on the 29th that the usage of artificial intelligence (AI) consultations, such as voice bots and chatbots applied to their customer center, has significantly increased to over 1.5 million cases per month. The proportion of AI consultations in the total number of consultations reached the scale of 3 to 4 out of every 10 customers.

SK Telecom introduced a chatbot for text chat consultations via the 1535 number in 2018, and in 2020, it became the first in the domestic telecommunications industry to introduce a voice bot for AI consultations conducted verbally with customers. As of September, AI speaker NUGU’s text-to-speech (TTS) technology has been applied to about 60 ARS guidance items, providing the same voice guidance as the voice bot during 114 (mobile phone consultation) and 1600-2000 (internet and IPTV consultation) services.

Since the full-scale launch of chatbot and voice bot consultations in 2020, the share of AI consultation services in the total customer center consultations has steadily increased. As of the end of September, AI consultations accounted for 38% of all customer center consultations, indicating that more than 3 out of 10 customers use AI consultations. This is analyzed as a result of the expansion of customer consultation areas due to AI advancement and the increased accuracy of consultations.

SK Telecom plans to evolve into an ‘AI First, AI Anywhere’ customer center that enables 24/7 customer consultations by prioritizing AI application across all areas of customer center consultation services. In early September, AI consultation-capable chatbot services were applied to T Phone and mobile T World. They also provided the industry’s first transfer function, where NUGU answers questions and requests that the chatbot cannot respond to.

In particular, SK Telecom plans to upgrade the voice bot, which applies SK Telecom’s AI conversational technology (NUGU Interactive) not to simple consultations but to high-difficulty and frequently asked customer inquiries, within this year. Additionally, leveraging the capabilities accumulated through AI consultation service operations, they intend to actively promote a cloud-based AI contact center business targeting enterprises.

Lee Ki-yoon, Head of Customer Value Innovation at SK Telecom, stated, “By setting a long-term goal of transforming into an AI customer center and continuing investments, we have achieved increased customer satisfaction and improved consultation service quality.” He emphasized, “We will continue to strive to deliver new value to customers using ICT as a leading AI service company.”

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