SK Telecom signed a business agreement with K-water on July 16 to cooperate in smart water supply operation and management projects and improve water welfare based on water data.
Officials including Oh Bong-rok, head of the integrated water management division of the K-water, and Shin Yong-sik, head of SK Telecom's Massive IoT business division, attended the signing ceremony held at the Namsan Building in Seoul on July 16 to discuss future direction of cooperation.
Through this agreement, the two companies decided to support IoT infrastructure for smart water supply management, upgrade water resource management systems, and promote socially disadvantaged care demonstration services using data.
To this end, they are planning to cooperate with each other to establish standards for water supply management based on IoT technology, and select local governments that are subject to demonstration of smart water supply operation management and carry out demonstration services within this year.
They will analyze the usage and usage patterns of the socially disadvantaged with big data and study ways to upgrade the care service by combining SK Telecom's mobile phone history and data usage through smart meters.
In addition, they plan to contribute to the government's digital New Deal and Green New Deal policies by participating in the nationwide smart pipe network management infrastructure construction project in the second half of the year and the efficient operation of water supply by region.
LoRa network, which is dedicated to IoT, will be applied to SK Telecom's remote meter reading project for each local government. It is evaluated that LoRa Network is suitable for remote meter reading due to its low power consumption compared to LTE, wide coverage of telecommunication, and low communication fees.
SK Telecom has built LTE Cat.M1 across the country that can send low-capacity videos and HD-class photos and has a nationwide IoT hybrid network with LoRa. Through this, various services are provided, such as water, gas, electric power AMI, location control of persons and objects, and monitoring of facilities and equipment conditions.
The K-water is leading the upgrading of the water supply system and the vitalization of related industries through water management ecosystem management across the country and water management consignment projects by major local governments.
It is expected that SK Telecom will be able to secure more stable and economical smart meter technology and continue to discover services that enhance the public's benefits.
Shin Yong-sik, head of SK Telecom's Massive IoT Business Division, said, "We are planning to contribute to green conversion and vitalization of the national economy by upgrading the water management system based on IoT through cooperation between the two companies. We will lead global water management standards through ICT-based water management innovation and also contribute to solving water problems in the world."
