SK Telecom Collaborates with Samsung to "Enhance Base Station Performance with AI... Improve 5G Quality"

Applying AI to Commercial Networks... Wireless Network Advancement
"Providing Differentiated Customer Experience through AI Convergence"
"Leading the Evolution of Next-Generation Networks"

SK Telecom announced on the 28th that it will advance its wireless network by applying AI-based 5G base station quality optimization technology (AI-RAN Parameter Recommender) to its commercial network through collaboration with Samsung Electronics.

SKT and Samsung Electronics have continuously worked on learning from past mobile network operation experiences using AI and deep learning. They recently completed the development of technology that automatically recommends optimal parameters tailored to each base station environment.

In this process, the two companies applied the related AI technology to SKT's commercial network for verification and confirmed that this technology can enhance customer-perceived quality by unlocking the potential performance of 5G base stations.

Mobile communication base stations experience differences in 5G service quality across regions even when using equipment of the same specifications, due to geographical factors and surrounding facilities. To address this, SKT succeeded in automatically deriving optimal parameters for improving perceived quality by analyzing and learning the correlation between accumulated statistical data from existing wireless networks and AI operational parameters through deep learning.

Samsung Electronics' 'Network Parameter Optimization AI Model,' used in this verification, streamlines resources deployed for wireless network environment and performance optimization, enabling the management of widely established mobile networks at the cluster level in an optimal state.

SKT is advancing the technology by having AI automatically adjust the output of base station radio signals or reset the allowable range for radio retransmission to improve quality when radio signals are weak or data transmission errors occur due to interference.

Furthermore, SKT plans to continuously enhance the technology's completeness by expanding the scope of AI-optimizable targets, such as beamforming-related parameters, and developing real-time application functions. Beamforming refers to a technology that concentrates signals received through antennas toward specific receiving devices to transmit and receive signals more strongly.

Ryu Tak-gi, head of infrastructure technology at SK Telecom, said, "This achievement is meaningful as it confirms that AI can maximize the potential performance of individual base stations," adding, "We will accelerate the evolution into an AI-native network that provides differentiated customer experiences through the convergence of communication and AI technologies."

Choi Sung-hyun, head of the advanced development team at Samsung Electronics' Network Business Division, stated, "AI is a core technology for innovation across various industries and plays a decisive role in the evolution to next-generation networks," and added, "We will continue to lead the development of intelligent and automated technologies for AI-based next-generation networks."