SK Telecom said in a regulatory filing that its net profit had soared 25.2 percent, to 1.87 trillion won ($1.91 billion). Operating profit for the year was 2.65 trillion won ($2.70 billion), up 12.5 percent.

The company’s fourth-quarter sales rose to 2.63 trillion won, up 5.7 percent year-on-year. Operating profit climbed 10.16 percent, to 654.8 billion won, with net profit reaching 447.9 billion won, up 28.7 percent from a year ago.

SK Telecom saw 2005 revenue from the wireless Internet business rise 34.9 percent, to 2.46 trillion won, accounting for 26.6 percent of total sales, up 6 percent from 2004.

It also said 750,000 new customers had joined its mobile telecommunications service community last year, bringing the total subscription base to 19.53 million, or 50.9 percent of the country's 38.2 million mobile-service users. South Korea’s population exceeds 48 million, according to government figures.

SK Telecom expects to see 10.5 trillion won in total sales this year, with the proportion of revenue from wireless Internet reaching 29.5 percent of total sales. It also forecast the number of mobile-service subscribers to rise to 20 million this year.

The company added that it has earmarked 1.6 trillion won for capital investment, including 570 billion won for high-speed downlink packet access (HSDPA) and 170 billion won for mobile Internet business.