[Pangyo Tech] Kakaomakers Surpassed 400 Billion Won in Accumulated Transactions

    LOS ANGELES, CA, June 22, 2021 /24-7PressRelease/ -- Kakaocommerce (CEO Eun Taek Hong) announced on the 14th that Kakaomakers, its custom production platform, has surpassed 400 billion won in accumulated transactions in 6 months since it surpassed 300 billion won in accumulated transactions in November last year.

Kakaomakers started under the name of "Makers with Kakao" in 2016. Going beyond making donations of financial resources, it was Kakao's first project that addressed social issues with its abilities. When it was created, Kakaomakers focused on solving inventory problems which have been around for decades in manufacturing through custom production. So it figured out demand through pre-order in order to produce the predicted amount and minimized economic loss and environmental damage caused by unnecessary cost and remaining inventory.

Kakaomakers which tried to manufacture creative customized products of SMEs is expanding its product base laying groundwork for growth towards a large company.

• Large brands can pre-release their new products in Kakaomakers… It is taking root as a "marketing place"

Large brands that pre-release their new products in Kakaomakers are on the rise. Large brands that can manage supply and demand and inventory in a stable manner can reduce product failure rates through custom manufacturing.

Merchandisers of Kakaomakers communicate with customers and reflect feedback on product development. Since merchandisers listen to customers' candid feedback, large brands are able to read consumer trends prior to release and reflect feedback on product improvements which makes Kakaomakers an attractive marketing place.

In actuality, 50% of new orders this year were pre-leased products. 10,000 orders of "Ottogi Gogiri perilla oil noodles" set which was pre-released in May were sold out during the first 3 hours of sale. The order of 1,200 units of Samsung Electronics' "smart monitor M5 white edition" were made for a week even though it was a high-priced product.

SMEs which are more vulnerable to product failure can become a stepping-stone of product release and expansion of distribution channels. Ilko Electronics which was created by a former executive of Daewoo Electronics unveiled a dryer for single-person households in Kakaomakers. It was the first experiment but it was well-received by consumers which is followed by several more cases of pre-release. This not only allowed businesses to start mass production but also helped them enter the global market.

• A different attempt is made during choosing and releasing of a product
Recently, it has been trying a new method where users can choose the design of products through pre-order voting. A "yogurt cold bag" project was carried out in collaboration with Korea Yakult. Users voted one out of three designs and the final design was manufactured which received 2,000 orders during the first three days of sale.

In addition, a differentiated curation is another pillar of growth. In order to relieve pandemic fatigue and meet consumers' travel needs, it released an exclusive domestic hotel voucher which increased the number of orders in the first quarter 19 times the fourth quarter last year.

Kakaocommerce is planning to work with large brands to strengthen user value, "curation of new products" and environmentally-friendly value, "production with fast turnover of stock" of Kakaocommerce.

An insider of Kakaommerce said, "Kakaomakers is a curation commerce that introduces products which give new value after merchandisers actually sample them. We will expand cooperation with large brands laying the foundation as "a new marketing place" where consumers encounter new products for the first time and at the same time maximize the strengths of curation commerce that selects useful products."

Kakaomakers is based in Pangyo. Pangyo Technovalley is an innovation hub for global companies comparable to the Silicon Valley in the US, Zhongguancun in China, and STATION F in France. It is an Asia tech hub with 1,259 IT, BT, CT, and NT companies that possess innovative products and technologies. Located just south of the metropolitan area, it provides the best environment for Korean companies to do business with great transportation access and infrastructure.

Various high-tech companies are located in Pangyo Technovalley, and it is occupied by 64,000 full-time employees, many in their 20-30s. In terms of industry, the companies are engaged in information technology, contents technology, biotechnology, and nanotechnology.

With the support of innovative companies with global capabilities such as Kakao, Naver, AhnLab, Krafton, NCSoft, Nexon, and Hancom, companies in Pangyo Technovalley recorded 107 trillion won in sales last year. Investment and infrastructure growth in Pangyo is expected to continue, with the Metaverse hub entering Pangyo this year.

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