SK Telecom Firms Up 5G Mobile Edge Partnership With Deutsche Telekom

Almost two weeks after launching its 5G commercial network in South Korea, SK Telecom flagged an agreement with German telecom giant Deutsche Telekom (DT) to carry out joint projects in the field of mobile edge computing (MEC) for 5G. The South Korean operator has agreed to partner with MobiledgeX, a U.S.-based subsidiary formed by DT earlier this year to provide a platform for developers to work on low-latency applications. It’s run as an independent company to attract other operators to participate, and it’s located in Menlo Park, California. This latest announcement follows an agreement announced in October 2018, when the two carriers said they planned to exchange funds to help bolster each other’s 5G deployment plans. The agreement called for SK Telecom to invest an unspecified amount into MobiledgeX. DT, in turn, is to invest the same unknown amount into Swiss-based ID Quantique, which is an SK Telecom strategic partner that focuses on quantum cryptography communication technology. The SK Telecom side of the bargain now seems to be taking on a sharper form and reflects what the two carriers describe as an “aligned vision” on the role they expect, and hope, mobile carriers will play in the future development of mobile applications.