KT Corporation, Korea’s largest fixed-line telephone and high-speed internet provider, continues to invest in an attempt to transform itself into a multi-media industry group. KT Corp. has just acquired 51% of Sidus FNH. Sidus FNH is the largest filmmaker in South Korea. This follows an 8 billion won ($7.8 million) June investment in a 30 billion won movie investment fund established by Show Box, Korea’s second-largest movie distributor. Analysts also believe that KT is currently negotiating a contract with Walt Disney to distribute the company’s content through mobile channels.

Nam Joong-soo, KT’s newly appointed CEO, told reporters that “contents, handsets and networks will be converged, putting the focus on customers.’. He also said that the company will invest 10.4 trillion won ($10 billion) between now and 2010, with 7.8 trillion won being used to strengthen South Korea’s telecom infrastructure and 2.6 trillion being spent on new growth areas.

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Content companies and telecoms in Europe and North America need to keep a close eye on the consolidation and developments in the content and distribution within South Korea. For good or bad, South Korea’s increased combination of content and distribution will help accelerate the market by removing discussions over pieces of the value chain. This may not be the best for the overall market, but it is sure to provide a consumer test bed for consumers’ opinions on digital content and access technologies.

In continuing our recent coverage of the mobile music sector, we found a truly interesting article from MobileMentalism (MM).

MM makes some great points about how device convergence is different for the mobile phone is different for the camera than for the portable music player. In the case of digital cameras, stand-alone cameras still offer an advantage over their camera-phone counterparts at the same price. This leaves a place for both combined and stand-alone cameras in the market.

Music capable cellphones though offer almost the same functionality as stand-alone music players such as iPods and Mp3 players. While this is true, battery life is still a major concern for consumers in the phone market. The devices may have the same capabilities, but the functionalities are very different.