Krafton signs MOU with Solana for blockchain-based games and services

South Korea’s leading game developer Krafton Inc. announced Wednesday it signed a memorandum of understanding with San Francisco-based Solana Labs.

Solana operates its namesake public blockchain platform with smart contract functionality. The platform claims to offer faster transaction times and lower costs than its main competitor, Ethereum.

The nature of the MOU is to collaborate on designing games and services built on the Solana blockchain. The two companies will work toward building new game titles incorporating non-fungible tokens (NFTs) and pursue joint investment opportunities in the blockchain industry. 

Solana was launched in 2020, six years after Ethereum. While the latter offers a more mature and decentralized network, Solana is generally seen to showcase higher efficiency. 

“We are pleased to share the future of games with Krafton, a company that brought innovations to the gaming industry,” said Johnny Lee, the head of Games Business Development at Solana Labs. 

Lee added that more players are looking for blockchain games and the companies that can meet such demand are slated for sustainable growth. A blockchain game refers to an online game that encompasses elements of cryptography-based blockchain technology.

A Krafton employee said, “We are actively pursuing partnerships with companies and communities that have demonstrated impressive technological development, like Solana, to create a Web 3.0 ecosystem.”

The industry insider elaborated that Krafton will exponentially increase the speed by which it will develop and distribute blockchain games with the latest agreement. 

During an in-house meeting on Jan. 27, the Seongnam-based company announced it will formalize its entry into the Web 3.0 and NFT businesses. 

Since then, it announced a string of collaborations with and investments in a number of industry heavyweights; namely online auction space Seoul Auction Blue Co., digital art platform XXBlue, and the metaverse arm of Naver Corp., Naver Z.

Prior to the January announcement, the game developer acquired interactive content production company thingsflow Inc. last June.

The deal was aimed at recruiting the core members of thingsflow's AI-powered content platform Hellobot, demonstrating its blueprint to expand beyond the online game sector. 

Write to Jee Abbey Lee at jal@hankyung.com