Kakao to unveil YouTube-like manga platform in Japan

Kakao Corp., the No. 1 digital comics platform in Japan, will expand deeper into the neighboring country's comics market by launching a platform where traditional Japanese manga publishers can upload their digital content.

Kim Jae-yong, chief executive of Japan-based Kakao Piccoma Corp., said on Mar. 2 that the new platform, dubbed Piccoverse, will be unveiled in Japan as early as the first half of this year.

Big-name manga publishers such as Kodansha and Shueisha are expected to join the YouTube-like platform, where they will be able to run separate channels and release their proprietary content.

“We are discussing the Piccoverse launch with established Japanese publishers,” Kim told The Korea Economic Daily.

Piccoverse will offer paid previews, allowing its audiences to watch the digital content before its general release. The proceeds will be shared between Piccoma and the publishers. 

Once its business model takes root, Piccoma will open up the platform to individual creators so that they can upload their creative works. It is also preparing to launch an online community to match fiction writers with illustrators.

Moreover, Piccoma will provide an artificial intelligence-powered curation service that offers recommendations and predicts the types of webtoons that would appeal to users, as well as reviews for digital comics.

“Comics magazines had contributed to the growth of Japan’s manga ecosystem. But they have been losing their influence in the digital era,” Kim said in an interview.

“Piccoverse will replace those magazines and serve as a platform to grow the ecosystem for Japanese creators.”

Piccoma, a Japanese subsidiary of South Korea's mobile messenger giant Kakao Corp., has solidified its top position in Japan's webtoon subscription market. 

It beat Naver Corp.’s Line Manga in 2020 and finally elbowed out Japan’s popular web magazine Matcha in 2021.

The transaction value on Piccoma jumped 73.4% on-year to 722.7 billion won ($601 million) in 2021, according to the company.

Japanese manga publishers also operate their own digital platforms, but their user number is estimated to be less than one-tenth of Piccoma's. 

IN EUROPE

Next month, Kakao is slated to launch the European version of Piccoma in France, in collaboration with Kakao Entertainment Co. The entertainment arm controls Kakao Webtoon and Tapas Media Inc., the third-largest US digital comics platform.

Piccoma is the only unit of Kakao Group, where its founder and Chairman Kim Beom-su remains as an executive director. Chairman Kim is so highly interested in the Japanese operations that he occasionally flies to the Japan office to review its business development, CEO Kim said.

Kakao has been pivoting toward overseas growth, after the mobile giant met with harsh criticism that its sprawling expansion at home had been driven by community businesses and was made at the expense of mom-and-pop stores.  

Write to Min-Ki Koo at kook@hankyung.com
Yeonhee Kim edited this article