The three major telecom companies in South Korea—SK Telecom, KT, and LG Uplus—released their Q1 2026 results, with SK Telecom recovering to an operating profit of 500 billion won, moving past the fallout from last year's USIM hacking incident. LG Uplus was the only company to report increases in both revenue and operating profit, demonstrating stable growth.
According to SK Telecom, its consolidated revenue for Q1 reached 4.39 trillion won, with an operating profit of 537.6 billion won. Although revenue decreased by 1.4% and operating profit by 5.3% compared to the previous year, the recovery of operating profit above 500 billion won raised expectations for improved performance in the second half of the year.
The wireless segment reported a 3% decline in revenue to 2.58 trillion won. However, the proportion of 5G subscribers grew to 81% of total handset subscribers, maintaining a market share of 45.7%.
In the wired segment, revenue increased by 2.2% year-over-year to 295.4 billion won, driven by a rise in high-speed internet subscribers and an increase in gigabit internet users. Conversely, revenue from paid broadcasting fell by 1.3% to 471.9 billion won, and enterprise revenue decreased by 1.7% to 274.7 billion won.
LG Uplus reported growth in both revenue and operating profit for Q1, with consolidated revenue of 3.80 trillion won, up 1.5%, and operating profit of 272.3 billion won, up 6.6% year-over-year.
The mobile segment's total revenue reached 1.65 trillion won, a 3.2% increase from the previous year, attributed to an increase in subscriber lines and enhanced competitiveness in core telecom operations. The total mobile subscriber lines grew by 6.4% year-over-year to approximately 39.03 million. Mobile network operator (MNO) lines increased by 7.1% to about 21.97 million, while mobile virtual network operator (MVNO) lines rose by 4.7% to about 8.96 million.
Revenue from the smart form segment, which includes IPTV and internet services, rose by 4.1% year-over-year to 656.3 billion won. IPTV revenue increased by 1.5% to 335.1 billion won, while internet revenue grew by 7.9% to 320 billion won.
Both companies' performance was bolstered by their AI businesses. SK Telecom's AI revenue nearly doubled compared to its sluggish telecom segment, with AIDC revenue soaring by 89.3% year-over-year to 131.4 billion won, driven by increased data center utilization and GPU as a Service (GPUaaS) sales.
LG Uplus also experienced growth in its AIDC business, with revenue increasing by 31% year-over-year to 114.4 billion won. An Hyung-kyun, head of the Enterprise AI Business Group, stated during the Q1 earnings call that the revenue from contracts secured last year is now being reflected, and he expects continued high growth. He added that the company plans to strategically expand its business in line with market conditions while reliably executing existing projects.
KT is set to announce its Q1 results on the 12th. Analysts predict KT's consolidated revenue for the quarter will be around 6.8 trillion to 6.9 trillion won, with operating profit expected between 480 billion and 520 billion won. The market anticipates that the impact of last year's femtocell hacking incident, increased security investments, customer compensation policies, and one-time gains from real estate sales will affect its performance.
* This article has been translated by AI.
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