South Korean Telecommunications Market

In 2009, the merger between KT-KTF consolidates KT Group and SKT Group as the two dominant leaders, and aggressive marketing of LG Group, based on tariff plans will be accelerated. Therefore, the South Korean telecommunications market is expected to remain active despite the global economic downturn. In addition, starting with the introduction of iPhone, global key players such as Sony Ericsson, RIM, HTC, as well as Google with its Android Phone, will advance into the Korean market.

The Korean mobile operators are forced to develop device vendor management policies to be prepared for the introduction of foreign smartphones in the market while service models allowing free participation of third-parties, such as Apple App Store should be considered.

When WIPI, Korea's local and unique platform environment, will be scrapped in April 2009, the introduction of application business models is expected to speed up. Accordingly, mobile content providers in Korea should be prepared with application development strategies fitted to smartphone trends and with response measures to secure their distribution channels.

Mobile devices and platforms have been at the center of evolution in the wireless market.

They are the most important 'media' overhauling users and contents usage. ROA Group predicts that smartphones will emerge as the powerful 'media' of the evolution in the South Korean mobile market during 2009.

In 2009 and 2010, the biggest questions are ""how to create new service business models amid rises of smartphones as the key trend of mobile device market?"" and ""how users can make use of this new media in their everyday lives?"" The contents of this report are as follows.

1. Korean Mobile Market in 2009

This part contains major market indexes and results of 2008 as well as forecast for 2009, highlighting the major issues among the three Korean mobile operators, SKT, KTF and LGT, including subscriber growth by operators and networks (WCDMA/CDMA), churn rate, average revenue per user, and CAPEX.

2. Mobile Device Market in 2009

Due to the global economic slowdown and increase in binding customers to long-term contract plans, mobile device market in South Korea will decrease 20% from 23.2 million to 21 million. Moreover, the lifting of mandatory WIPI regulations will complicate the market changes further. Despite decreases in the mobile device market, smartphone line-up will be more enriched in 2009. As global device vendors advance into the South Korean market, competition among global vendors and consolidated domestic vendors will intensify.

This part includes 5 major issues in 2009, considering the impact of the global mobile vendors.

3. Bundled Service Market in 2009

2009 will bring significant changes into the Korean telecommunications market as KTF, the second largest mobile operator in Korea, is going to complete its merger with KT at the end of June 2009, starting a war with SKT Group in the bundled products category.

This part focuses on future bundled product strategies of the leading companies in South Korea.

4. New Service Business Models in 2009

This part analyzes new service business models which are expected to rise in 2009. The three key words of service business models in 2009 are 'Socialized', 'Personalized' and 'Seamless.' This part provides detailed analysis on major service business models in the South Korean market, and includes valuable information for benchmarking.

Methodology

For this report, primary and secondary research was conducted, including interviews with experts in the Korean telecommunications industry. ROA's own methodologies were also used for forecasting subscriber growth and the development direction of technologies and services.

This Report is Useful for

This report is useful for telecom operators, device manufacturers and mobile content providers, who are interested in the development direction of telecommunication