South Korea's three mobile carriers this year jointly set "restoring customer trust" as their top task. Unlike last year, when they put AI at the forefront, they are signalling plans to restore trust shaken by a string of hacking incidents and to retool their core telecom businesses. They are also pursuing strategies to monetise new businesses such as AI data centres and enterprise AI as they seek to improve results.

◆A turbulent 2025 prompts the mobile carriers to stress "trust" in the new year

Last year, the telecoms industry was swept by security issues including an SK Telecom USIM hack, an unauthorised micropayment incident at KT and a personal data leak at LG Uplus. All three companies said their first mission this year is to stabilise their organisations and regain customer trust.

SK Telecom CEO Jeong Jae-heon, in a New Year message, cited strengthening competitiveness in mobile network operator services as the direction of change. This is seen as a sign of determination to regain trust lost in the USIM hacking incident and to drive an improvement in results. "Let us add depth to the basics and build a strong MNO," he said. Jeong also set accelerating AI and AX as New Year goals. Along with restoring customer trust, the plan is to expand AI transformation businesses in earnest.

KT, which suffered an unauthorised micropayment incident in the second half of last year, is also focusing its efforts on resolving information security risks. KT CEO Kim Young-seop said, "All of the routine work we do can become a target of intrusion attacks," as he called for a company-wide response in the process of restoring customer trust. He also set out an ambition to become an AX innovation partner recognised by the market by strengthening AX capabilities.

LG Uplus also presented trust as a key keyword this year. LG Uplus CEO Hong Beom-sik put forward "TRUST" as a New Year management keyword and stressed restoring customer trust as the top priority. TRUST means: promises to customers, the courage to reveal problems, solidarity, customer segmentation, and gratitude and praise. "When trust builds up, it becomes competitiveness that others cannot easily catch up with, and the speed of producing results will also become faster," Hong said.

◆Results show signs of recovery... the task is "AI monetisation"

FnGuide forecasts the combined 2025 revenue of the three mobile carriers will exceed 60 trillion won. SKT is expected to post 7.16 trillion won, KT 28.27 trillion won and LG Uplus 15.53 trillion won in revenue.

In particular, they are seen as having succeeded in defending profits despite the negative factor of hacking last year. The consensus for last year's operating profit for the three is 1.14 trillion won for SKT, 2.55 trillion won for KT and 949.3 billion won for LG Uplus. Combined, that is 4.64 trillion won, up 32.7 percent from the previous year.

This year, the three are expected to focus on expanding B2B-focused AI solutions, including AI data centres and enterprise AI services, while strengthening their core businesses. A telecoms industry official said, "While solidifying the fundamentals of the core telecom business, they will move in earnest to monetise AI this year," adding, "B2C AI has a burden in charging, but corporate customers are highly likely to expand adoption of carriers' AI infrastructure as needed."

KT's measure to waive termination fees is also cited as a key variable in the first quarter. KT is waiving termination fees through the 15th after the company was found at fault in the unauthorised micropayment incident. About 52,661 people are shown to have left KT from Dec. 31 through the 3rd of last month.

The industry sees competition to attract customers, in a situation where growth in new subscribers is limited, leading to higher marketing spending and first-quarter earnings volatility. An industry official said, "A battle to take subscribers among carriers will be unavoidable for the time being," adding, "Marketing costs may act as a key variable for results."