Naver (CEO Han Sung-suk) announced at the board meeting held on the 19th that it had decided to take over the global web novel platform Wattpad. Naver will acquire a 100% stake in Wattpad for about $600 million (660 billion won). Naver explained that through this acquisition, it has become the world’s No. 1 platform in webtoon and web fiction, respectively.
Whatpad is a global social storytelling platform that uses 23 billion minutes of over 90 million users a month. More than 1,500 works, such as’After’, have been published and produced as videos. The number of monthly users of Naver Webtoon is 72 million, and Naver is the largest global storytelling platform operator with more than 160 million users (a simple sum of monthly unique users of both companies) through Naver Webtoon and Wattpad. do.
Naver is able to expand Naver’s global content business more stably and effectively through ▲a base of 90 million Wattpad users in various cultures such as North America and Europe, and about 1 billion story contents left by 5 million creators. done.
In addition, the company is in a position that it is possible to advance the platform and business model of Watpad by combining the IP business know-how accumulated by Naver Webtoon.
Naver Webtoon created a PPS program (Page Profit Share Program) that leads to paid viewing, advertisements, and IP business in 2013, and launched global webtoon services such as English and Chinese in 2014, raising the webtoon content enjoyed by few enthusiasts to the global industry. As Wattpad has users in various regions such as North America and Europe, if webtoon’s business know-how is combined, it is expected that web novels will also have a solid creation ecosystem and grow into the underlying content of the entertainment industry in earnest.
Webtoon content can be reinforced as it is possible to produce webtoons verified on Whatpad. In particular, 80% of Whatpad users are composed of Gen Z, so it is possible to produce original content verified by the global Gen Z as Naver Webtoon. Naver Webtoon has already verified the possibility of success of global webtoonization based on web novels through the perspective of remarried empress and omniscient readers.
In addition, Wattpad also owns WhatPad Studio, which develops global video business, so it is expected that it will be able to visualize the original contents of Naver Webtoon and WatPad in a more diverse manner with Naver Webtoon’s Studio N.
Naver Webtoon CEO Kim Joon-koo said, “Naver Webtoon has secured a more diverse global storytelling IP through Watpad.” “I think we can take one step closer to the entertainment company in Korea.”
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He added, “As Korean writers have already started their activities globally through Naver Webtoon and earned more profits, we will try to make web novel writers more active in overseas expansion.”
Naver plans to complete the procedures of related organizations such as Korea, the United States, and Canada within the first half of this year.