SK Telecom buys stake in Unicom

A man charges his cellphone at a self-service booth of China Unicom Ltd in Shanghai. Kevin Lee/Bloomberg News

South Korean company SK Telecom Co will acquire 6.61 percent of China Unicom Ltd by converting $1 billion of China Unicom's bonds into shares, its latest effort to expand in the world's largest mobile service market.

SK Telecom will hold 899.7 million of China Unicom's shares after the conversion, making it the second-largest shareholder in the Chinese mobile operator, China Unicom said in a statement yesterday.