AXZ’s corporate value reset at 194.4 billion won, reflecting traffic and member data
Upstage’s AI search experiments draw attention — can Daum be reborn?
On the 12th, Kakao revised the transfer price of AXZ, the operator of portal site Daum, from 7 billion won to 194.4 billion won. <CI=Kakao, Upstage>
[Insight Korea = Choi Seo-young]
As Kakao reassesses the enterprise value of portal site Daum, platform assets such as user data and traffic accumulated through search and community services have emerged as key sources of value. With Upstage pushing ahead with an acquisition, Daum is also embarking on new platform experiments through AI-based real-time trend services and other initiatives.
AXZ’s value re-evaluated based on traffic and member data from Daum and Tistory
Kakao said on the 12th, through the electronic disclosure system, that it would adjust the transfer price of AXZ, the operator of portal site Daum, from the previous 7 billion won to 194.4 billion won. The sale price was recalculated based on the view that key assets such as service personnel and traffic had not been fully reflected.
In May last year, Kakao spun off Daum and established a new subsidiary called AXZ. In December of the same year, it transferred major services such as news, search, cafes and email to AXZ. Upstage is now in the process of acquiring AXZ from Kakao, with the share sale currently under way.
A Kakao official said, “When AXZ was spun off in May last year, key assets such as traffic, member numbers and staffing levels had not yet been clearly finalized. At the time, it was decided that a follow-up revaluation would be conducted for a more accurate valuation. This time, after reflecting those assets, the company’s value came out to about 194.4 billion won.”
According to Kakao, AXZ’s valuation was adjusted after including all assets tied to the operation of Daum, Tistory and other services, including traffic, member data and service personnel. In particular, the large user base accumulated through search and community services was re-evaluated as a core asset. If Upstage completes its acquisition of AXZ, those data assets could potentially be used to enhance its large language model and AI agent services.
Moon Hyung-nam, chairman of the Korea AI Education Association, said, “Daum is a platform that has accumulated a wide range of data and user activity across news, search, community and content.” He added, “Such data could become an important resource for advancing Korean-language artificial intelligence.” He also said that as the search market shifts toward new generative AI-based formats, Upstage could have an opportunity to open up a new market if it develops this into an AI search service.
On the 5th, Upstage CEO Kim Sung-hoon unveiled a case study showing the implementation of a “Daum Real-Time Trend Briefing” based on OpenClaw. <Facebook of Upstage CEO Kim Sung-hun>
Upstage experiments with combining AI agents and real-time trends
Daum launched its beta “Real-Time Trends” service on the 3rd. It is an updated version of the former “real-time issue search terms” feature, which had been scrapped in the past amid concerns over possible public opinion manipulation. The new service presents the flow of major issues by comprehensively analyzing not only search terms entered by users, but also news, cafe search histories and web document data.
Upstage CEO Kim Sung-hun also shared on his personal social media account on the 5th a case study showing the implementation of a “Daum Real-Time Trend Briefing” based on OpenClaw, an autonomous AI agent project. In this case, Daum’s real-time trend data are automatically collected, then combined with related news headlines and links, organized into a briefing format, and automatically sent via messaging platforms such as Telegram.
If Upstage acquires Daum, some observers say this kind of data flow could be expanded into services in which AI agents process and summarize information. There is growing speculation that a new kind of information discovery service could emerge, built on vast amounts of content and user activity data.
When it first moved to pursue the acquisition, Upstage said it was envisioning a next-generation AI platform centered on its in-house large language model, Solar, while making use of Daum’s extensive content data.
Still, some say it remains to be seen whether any of this will translate into a real service, given that the deal between Kakao and Upstage has not yet been finalized and that the AI agent example shared by Kim was closer to an experiment than a commercial product.
Moon said, “The search market is already structured around existing platforms. Technical potential alone does not guarantee success. The key factor will be how dramatically the actual user experience can be transformed.”
Meanwhile, Kakao is also accelerating the shutdown of some services that had been operated on the basis of Daum. The company plans to end its video platform Kakao TV on June 30, and will also discontinue its PC game channeling service within the first half of the year. As it gradually scales back services that originated from Daum, Kakao is restructuring its platform strategy around KakaoTalk.
-This article was translated by ChatGPT. (이 기사는 챗GPT가 번역했습니다.)
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