NHN will suspend its webtoon platform services in Korea, the English-speaking regions, and France within this year.
According to the information technology (IT) industry on the 16th, NHN announced that it will finally terminate the KoMiCo service in Korea and the Pocket Comics services in the English-speaking regions and France as of October 31. NHN is currently in discussions with content providers regarding the expiration of contracts, and works serialized on KoMiCo will be uniformly suspended as of November 15.
Users will be refunded for coins (digital currency) they have previously purchased, as well as for works they have collected that were purchased less than a year ago. However, the webtoon platform KoMiCo operated in Japan will remain intact. While the platform business in Korea will end, NHN KoMiCo Korea will focus on the production and distribution of webtoon content.
NHN has been actively engaged in the webtoon platform business, primarily in Japan, since 2013. It then expanded its service area to Korea, Southeast Asia, and North America, and entered France in 2022. However, it withdrew from the Southeast Asian webtoon market by selling the KoMiCo Vietnam entity in 2022 and the KoMiCo Thailand entity the following year, and will now cease services in all regions except Japan, significantly downsizing its business.
Recently, the growth momentum of the webtoon market has slowed, leading to the closure of many small and medium-sized webtoon platforms. In particular, as the dominance of Naver Webtoon and Kakao Page solidifies, assessments have emerged that the available space for smaller platforms has shrunk. Previously, the webtoon platform Manhwagyeong, operated by Woowa Brothers, and the platform Pina Toon under Amutas Japan both announced service closures last year and this year, respectively.
A NHN official noted, "This is a measure to improve the management efficiency of the webtoon business and enhance revenue in light of the uncertain external conditions of the global webtoon market and the oligopolistic structure of large platforms."