South Korea recently celebrated the 30th anniversary of its pioneering commercialization of Code Division Multiple Access (CDMA) mobile communications. This historic breakthrough established the foundational framework for the nation’s remarkable ascent as a global leader in information and communication technology (ICT).
SK Telecom emphasized on Thursday that this significant milestone highlights how early technological leadership, coupled with strategic public-private collaboration, profoundly transformed Korea’s telecom industry and dramatically accelerated digital adoption nationwide.
The era of digital mobile communications officially began in South Korea on April 12, 1996. On this date, Samsung Electronics launched its first CDMA handset, the SCH-100, while Korea Mobile Telecommunications—the direct predecessor of today’s SK Telecom—commenced commercial CDMA services across Seoul and its surrounding regions. This made Korea the very first country globally to commercialize digital mobile communication technology.
Remarkably, nationwide CDMA coverage was achieved within just nine months, rapidly integrating mobile connectivity as a core national infrastructure essential for economic growth and social development.
As a pivotal second-generation (2G) mobile technology, CDMA offered significant advancements. It enabled multiple users to efficiently share a single frequency simultaneously through unique coding, providing considerably higher call capacity and improved communication quality compared to the then-predominant Time Division Multiple Access (TDMA) standard.
The economic ramifications of CDMA adoption have been profound and transformative for South Korea. The ICT sector’s contribution to the nation’s gross domestic product (GDP) surged from a mere 2.2 percent in 1996 to an anticipated 13.1 percent by 2025. Over the same period, industry output expanded exponentially from 17.8 trillion won to an impressive 304 trillion won ($205 billion), with IT exports soaring more than sixfold.
This groundbreaking success was largely driven by a forward-thinking strategic decision to adopt CDMA as a unified national mobile standard. This initiative was powered by unparalleled collaboration between key entities like the Electronics and Telecommunications Research Institute (ETRI) and leading companies such as Samsung Electronics and LG Electronics.
The global significance of South Korea’s CDMA achievement was recognized in 2024 by the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers (IEEE), a prominent international engineering and technology standards body. The IEEE hailed it as a transformative milestone comparable in impact to the invention of the transistor and the very birth of the internet.
Industry experts now contend that South Korea must apply the lessons learned from its CDMA success story to the burgeoning field of artificial intelligence (AI). They advocate for the urgent development of robust “AI infrastructure” to ensure the nation’s sustained global competitiveness in the coming decades.
“Just as CDMA marked the foundational starting point for Korea’s ICT rise, the development of robust AI infrastructure will undeniably define the country’s competitiveness over the next 30 years,” stated Lee Nae-chan, an economics professor at Hansung University, underscoring AI’s critical future role.
SK Telecom officials further added that in the rapidly evolving AI era, communication networks themselves are transforming into sophisticated “intelligent infrastructure.” This evolution is set to underpin transformative innovation across a diverse range of industries, from advanced manufacturing to complex financial services.
yeeun
