South Korea’s largest telecoms provider, KT Corporation, is boosting a partnership with China Mobile targeting blockchain technology and 5G roaming.

As local English-language news outlet The Korea Herald reported on Dec. 5, KT is preparing to debut 5G roaming capabilities in China later this month. 

KT Corp. eyes B.Link blockchain rollout

At the same time, the companies are working on a blockchain system which will allow them to save time and costs when computing roaming charges for mobile users. 

According to The Korea Herald, the B.Link system is able to “self-analyze roaming data from the two carriers and can process roaming charges on a real-time basis.”

The news comes around six months after KT revealed it had built a blockchain network of its own. KT Network Blockchain similarly targets roaming, along with other use cases such as user identification.

That announcement in turn followed KT’s Blockchain-as-a-Service, or BaaS, which aims to ease access to the technology for South Korean firms. 

Telecoms embraces blockchain potential

As Cointelegraph reported, both South Korea and China have thrown their weight behind blockchain technology, the latter making it part of formal state policy in a widely-reported publicity campaign last month. 

Enthusiasm is also palpable in South Korea, with technology giant Kakao Corporation describing its Klaytn blockchain offering as being more advanced than Facebook’s Libra project in recent comments.

For the telecoms industry specifically, blockchain meanwhile should bring $1 billion of added value by 2023, according to a study published last year.