NTT DOCOMO, announced today that it will launch a Voice-over-LTE (VoLTE) international roaming service in South Korea on the October 7th through a cooperative initiative with Seoul-based KT Corporation, one of South Korea's largest mobile operators. Nine smartphones in DOCOMO's newly-released winter/spring lineup are compatible with the new service, said the operator.
DOCOMO becomes Japan's first mobile operator to offer a VoLTE outbound roaming service. The operator expects to expand its VoLTE roaming service into other countries through partnerships with local companies.
The service incorporates the S8 Home Routed (S8HR) architecture, which is used to enhance the existing LTE data roaming architecture to support VoLTE under roaming environment, enabling fast and efficient commercialization of VoLTE roaming services. The S8HR architecture is a method based on 3GPP standards to realize VoLTE roaming.