KT said on Feb. 8 it will pay 91.5 billion won in delivery payments early to small and mid-sized partner firms ahead of the Lunar New Year holiday, together with major group affiliates.

KT also runs a co-prosperity programme to support partners' stable business operations in addition to early payments. It is promoting mutual growth with partners by creating and operating a 100 billion won low-interest co-prosperity fund for partner firms.

KT will also launch a "Clean KT campaign" to strengthen the practice of ethical management for the Lunar New Year holiday. It will completely ban the exchange of gifts with stakeholders, including partner firms. If gifts are unavoidably delivered to employees, the company plans to maintain a transparent and fair trading culture by returning them with a letter of refusal enclosed for the sender or donating them to social welfare organisations.

Lee Won-jun (이원준), KT's head of procurement and an executive vice president, said, "Every year, KT is putting efforts into meaningfully easing the financial burden of partner firms through early payment of delivery bills ahead of holidays." He added, "We will continue to strengthen group-level co-prosperity cooperation to create an environment in which partner firms can grow stably."