Kim Bum-Seok achieved the `10 year dream` Coupang listing, driving momentum, shaking the distribution plate

◆ Coupang Distribution Big Bang ① ◆

Coupang was listed on the New York Stock Exchange (NYSE) after being recognized for its corporate value of 63 billion dollars (about 72 trillion won). The change in the perception of the Korean distribution ecosystem triggered by Coupang is expected to accelerate.

The corporate value of Coupang is E-Mart (4.99 trillion won), CJ Logistics (3.88 trillion won), Lotte Shopping (3.6 trillion won), BGF Retail (3 trillion won), GS Retail (2.85 trillion won), Shinsegae ( This is larger than the combined market cap of large retailers such as 2.84 trillion won) and Hyundai Department Store (2 trillion won). In addition, the market caps of Naver (61.500 trillion won) and Kakao (42.500 trillion won), which are competing for platforms in the e-commerce market, are also well above the level.

Coupang is expected to use $3.5 billion (approximately 4 trillion won) raised through IPO for logistics warehouse investment, courier service, and logistics agency (full-filment). Some analyzes say that it will build a logistics warehouse with 193 soccer fields to gain a leading edge in the’shipping war’. Coupang’s e-commerce market share is 13% based on volume. Investors are expecting Coupang to raise its market share to 40%, like Amazon. The essential difference between Coupang and existing retailers diverges in the business model. Coupang chose not’profit’ but’customer satisfaction’ as a business model. Coupang’s consistent goal is to make Coupang’s users think’how would they have lived without Coupang?’, as Coupang Chairman Kim Bum-seok stated in the listing report. Through the listing of Coupang, it is said that Chairman Kim has achieved his dream.

In an interview with CNBC on the 11th (local time), Chairman Kim said, “(Listing on the New York Stock Exchange) is just the beginning.” Born in Seoul in October 1978, Chairman Kim went to the United States at the age of 7 following his father, who is working at a domestic construction company. After that, he graduated from Deerfield Academy, a prestigious boarding school in the United States, and Department of Politics at Harvard University. Chairman Kim was interested in starting a media company from the time he was enrolled in college, and in 1998 he founded the current affairs magazine’Current’, distributed it to students for free, and made profits through advertisements from local advertisers. It is famous for the case of selling it to Newsweek after 3 years since its founding. He joined the Boston Consulting Group in 2002, but after two years, he left the company and established a magazine called’Vintage Media’. It was intended to provide current affairs education information to prestigious college students in the United States. However, when the project did not produce any results, it was sold and entered the Harvard Business School (MBA) in 2009. At that time, the business that caught his eyes was’Groupon,’ which is called the beginning of social commerce. With the intention of applying this project to the Korean market, Chairman Kim withdrew from the Harvard MBA after half a year, and then returned to Korea to establish Coupang. Coupang, which means’coupons are pouring out’, opened the door to the market by being called the 3rd general manager of social commerce along with WeMef and Timon.

The change took place in Coupang, which has been focusing on ticket sales, when the industry first introduced its own next-day delivery service,’Rocket Delivery,’ in 2014. The expansion of the direct logistics network was due to the judgment that e-commerce competitiveness in the long term would be judged by’delivery quality’. Satisfaction with the service has also increased in that it is delivered by employees who have hired directly with the fast delivery speed. In the midst of such high appreciation, competition in the industry accelerated by securing large amounts of investment from global investment groups such as Softbank Vision Fund. However, it is true that as the scale of operating losses due to increased expenses such as logistics and labor costs increased every year, there were also voices of concern that the industry would not be able to sustain it for a long time. Coupang continued to invest aggressively, adhering to the position of a’planned deficit’ to rise to the top of the industry, emphasizing the rapid increase in sales and profitability improvement. As in the case of Amazon in the United States, it was a paved stone to seize victory in domestic e-commerce.

[뉴욕 = 박용범 특파원 / 서울 = 김기정 기자 / 박대의 기자]
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