By Hana Anandira

Operator quintet set to form AI JV

Members of the Global Telco AI Alliance unveiled a plan to launch a joint venture later this year focused on developing Large Language Models (LLM) specifically for telecommunications companies.

During the first day of MWC24, SK Telecom highlighted the goals of the new entity which will be formed together with its partners in the alliance: e&, Singtel, Deutsche Telekom and SoftBank Corp.

The new venture will be charged with developing AI models optimised for common languages used in the operators’ respective home markets, though there are plans to eventually expand the number supported.

Members emphasised digital assistants could be trained to provide a more “personalised” customer experience and boost overall telecoms services to reach a global customer base of approximately 1.3 billion, spanning 50 countries.

The Global Telco AI Alliance was formed in July 2023 by SK Telecom, e&, Singtel and Deutsche Telekom, with SoftBank recently joining.

Work on developing the telco-focused models is already underway.

Eric Davis, VP of Language Superintelligence Labs at SK Telecom, identified the importance of working with academic researchers and language specialists in pushing for multilingual AI models, telling MWC Daily News the group is collaborating with experts “in different markets” to better represent less-spoken languages.