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Beyond traditional collective bargaining items such as wage increases, retirement age extensions, and reduced working hours, new flashpoints have emerged—including subsidiary divestitures and employment protection during the AI transition—raising concerns about weakened external competitiveness. According to industry sources on the 28th, SK Telecom, KT, and LG Uplus are each engaged in wage and collective bargaining negotiations with their unions or are locked in disputes over specific issues. SK Telecom is facing resistance from the SK Broadband Labor Union’s SK Stoa chapter over its plan to sell subsidiary SK Stoa to Rafolabs. The union argues that SK Telecom has structured the deal to retain a 20–30% stake in SK Stoa, thereby reducing Rafolabs’ acquisition burden, and criticizes that the public-interest requirements associated with acquiring a broadcasting business could be compromised. KT is negotiating wages and working conditions with two separate unions. The first union is demanding a flat 6% wage increase, employee stock grants, abolition of the wage peak system, and retirement age extension aligned with national pension eligibility. The second union has put forward demands including a 4.5-day workweek as part of broader working-hour reductions, worker protections during the AI transition, mutual growth with group affiliates and partners, worker participation in management, and governance improvements. LG Uplus’s union is recruiting members to join litigation against the company seeking to include personal incentives (PI) in average wage calculations. The union is also demanding an 8% increase in total annual wages, payment of 30% of operating profit as performance bonuses, 200 employee shares and holiday bonuses of 2 million won (approximately $1,500) each, a 35-hour workweek without wage reductions, and extension of the retirement age to 65. Labor-management conflict intersects with AI business restructuring The heightened attention on labor negotiations at the three carriers stems from their AI-centered business restructuring. As the mobile telecommunications market reaches maturity, all three companies are expanding investments in AI data centers (AIDC) and B2B AI businesses as new growth engines. KT plans to invest 5 trillion won (approximately $3.7 billion) over the next five years to secure 1 gigawatt (GW) of AI data center infrastructure. LG Uplus is increasing related investments, including construction of a large-scale AI data center in Paju, while SK Telecom has designated AI data centers as a core growth business and is expanding operations domestically and internationally. This business restructuring entails changes to organizational and workforce structures. Shifting from a mobile-centric business model to one with greater AI emphasis requires securing specialized talent in new fields while redeploying existing personnel. In this process, union demands such as reduced working hours, extended retirement age, and wage system reforms could directly impact future workforce management and cost structures. “Prolonged conflict possible if no common ground found” Union demands for wage increases and improved working conditions are part of the annual wage and collective bargaining cycle. However, this year’s demands extend beyond wages to encompass subsidiary divestitures, retirement age, working hours, and worker protections during the AI transition—issues that directly intersect with corporate business and workforce operations. A telecommunications industry source noted, “This can be viewed as a process where unions present high initial demands and then negotiate with management. However, if both sides fail to find common ground on core issues, labor-management conflict could become prolonged.” Kim Dae-jong, professor of business administration at Sejong University, said, “Following the performance bonus controversies at Samsung Electronics and SK Hynix, union demands for better compensation and working conditions have been growing across the industrial sector. At a time when the three carriers need to expand investment to secure AI competitiveness, prolonged conflict over working conditions such as a 35-hour workweek could translate into significant management burdens for these companies.” BigGo Finance Related Topics: Up Next Asia data center debt binge hitting banks’ limits, Barclays Don't Miss Chinese court freezes $300M of Nexperia assets in Wingtech case Click to comment You must be logged in to post a comment Login Leave a Reply Cancel reply You must be logged in to post a comment. 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