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SEOUL, May 1 (Korea Bizwire) — South Korean startups are carrying out intensive restructuring amid lingering concerns over the state of financial markets ignited by the collapse of the United States-based Silicon Valley Bank (SVB).
Zigbang, the country’s top home-matching platform, began conducting individual interviews regarding annual evaluation results starting this month and pushed many employees, including underperformers, to resign.
There are internal rumors that the company plans to dismiss 50 employees, or about 10 percent of its total workforce, and some employees have already resigned.
In the midst of a decline in real estate transaction volume resulting from interest rate hikes worldwide, Zigbang suffered an operating loss of 37 billion won last year (US$27.5 million), almost five times more than in 2020 when it first moved into the red.
During the same period, its personnel expenses more than doubled to 23.3 billion won, primarily due to its acquisition of Samsung SDS Co.’s home Internet-of-Things (IoT) unit.
Meanwhile, agtech startup Green Labs and fintech company Bank Salad also carried out top-to-bottom personnel reductions due to management difficulties.
In the first quarter of this year, the amount of venture investments stood at 881.5 billion won, down 60.3 percent year-on-year, according to data from the Ministry of Small and Medium-sized Enterprises (SMEs) and Startups.
M. H. Lee (mhlee@koreabizwire.com)
