Kakao's cloud service wing attracts new investment from state policy bank

 
SEOUL -- The artificial intelligence-based cloud service wing of Kakao, a major web service company involved in a variety of technology-related businesses in South Korea, attracted new investment from a state policy bank to promote various business cooperation for the digital transformation of domestic industries and expand technology investment for new businesses.

Korea Develop Bank (KDB) said on January 6 that it would invest 100 billion won ($92 million) in a third-party paid-in capital increase by Kakao Enterprise, which operates corporate-tailored IT platforms. "This is KDB's largest scale-up investment in domestic innovative companies, and it means that we have started to foster innovative industries with domestic capita," said KDB head Lee Dong-gull.

"We will lead the digital transformation of all industries and create an ecosystem of artificial intelligence platforms in South Korea." Kakao Enterprise CEO Andrew Baek said in a statement.

In an effort to compete with global leaders such as Amazon and Microsoft, Kakao has launched Kakao Enterprise to provide PaaS (platform as a service) and SaaS (Software as a service) interlinked with Kakao I, an AI platform. Amazon and Microsoft are top players in South Korea's cloud computing-based PaaS and SaaS markets. PaaS and SaaS are provided to businesses and enterprises in various sectors including manufacturing, security, fintech and healthcare.