This photo provided by Kakao Corp. shows its Pangyo office in Seongnam, Gyeonggi Province.
SEOUL, Aug. 1 (Korea Bizwire) — South Korea’s IT industry is exploring ways to survive in a prolonged economic slump, with no clear signs of improvement in sight.
The labor union of Kakao Corp., the operator of South Korea’s dominant messaging app KakaoTalk, recently held its first rally since its establishment in October 2018 as voluntary retirement programs are underway mainly at flagship subsidiaries, escalating employment insecurity.
“The growth of Internet and platform companies operating based on online traffic has slowed from the second half of 2022,” said Shinhan Investment & Securities in a recent report.
“The first half of the year 2023 was the period when the pace of slowdown accelerated, with some of their businesses suffering negative growth.”
Naver Corp. is also shutting down or integrating some of its businesses with a low number of users or sluggish performance.
The downsizing trend in the Korean branches of big tech companies, initiated from late last year, is ongoing.
Amazon Web Service (AWS) Korea, the local cloud-computing service affiliate of the U.S. retail giant Amazon, conducted a round of voluntary retirements in May and plans to conduct another round of restructuring soon.
Google Korea also sent emails to employees stating that restructuring is inevitable this year, while Microsoft Korea recently announced the resignation of its CEO.
J. S. Shin (js_shin@koreabizwire.com)
