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| Kim Beom-su, chairman of Daum Kakao, speaks during a opening ceremony of the Startup Nations Summit at the Sheraton Grand Wakerhill in Seoul, Monday. / Yonhap |
By Bahk Eun-ji
Kim Beom-su, chairman of Daum Kakao, said Monday that enterprises, especially start-ups, are the main vehicles that can consistently change society through innovation.
He also gave practical tips to young entrepreneurs during a keynote speech at the third annual Startup Nations Summit, Monday, at the Sheraton Grand Walkerhill Hotel in Seoul.
Under the theme of "The Age of the Entrepreneur," Kim suggested the idea of "social impact" as the most important factor to be successful for a start-up.
"The most efficient organization that can consistently change society is an enterprise. It should be capable of leading systematic change in society though innovative ideas and at the same time be able to achieve financial soundness," he said.
As co-founder of nation's first mobile messenger app KakaoTalk, Kim shared his own experiences of setting up the business with young entrepreneurs.
He said he founded KakaoTalk as he believed communication is the core value in the mobile age.
However, creating a value-added eco-system is way more important than success of mere services, he said as he discussed the platform business.
"The strategy for growth in the platform business is different from services. It has to come with the question of how to connect to each other instead of how to sell products," Kim said. "KakaoGame was made in line with this theory."
When it was initially released two years ago, there were only 10 kinds of games, but it has since grown as a mobile game platform, providing more than 600 different ones.
He added that the merger of Daum and Kakao was also under his belief to grow the business as a platform that will have a greater impact on society.
Daum Communications and Kakao formed a single entity after merging last month.
In order to realize social changes as an entrepreneur, Kim set up K Cube Ventures, a venture capital and early stage investment firm, and began a project titled "Fostering 100 CEOs." So far, the firm supports 36 young startup CEOs.
