KT profit rises on back of cloud demand
KT posted operating profit of 342 billion won and sales of 5.87 trillion won in the second quarter of 2020, the company said on Monday.
It is a rise of 18.6% and decline of 3.6%, respectively, from the same time period a year ago.
The South Korean telco said efficient management of costs and demand rising for its cloud and data centre services from enterprise clients in light of the COVID-19 pandemic helped its profit.
Its cloud and data centre businesses, combined, saw sales increase 16% compared to a year prior and showed the highest level of growth among all its businesses, the telco said.
But the South Korean telco saw an overall drop in smartphone sales in the quarter, it said. However, KT said its 5G subscriptions have continued to increase.
It had 2.24 million 5G subscribers as of the second quarter, which now accounts for 16% of its total number of subscribers, the telco said.
Its IPTV service also secured 137,000 subscribers in the second quarter, double that of the previous quarter, which is likely caused by the pandemic.
KT said it will focus on both 5G and business-to-business services such as cloud and data centres.
Compatriots SK Telecom and LG Uplus also saw their second quarter earnings rise on the back of 5G subscribers and remote services such as content and data centres.