NCSOFT taps ex-Pearl Abyss US head to lead N.America unit

NCSOFT Corp., South Korea’s major gaming company, said on Monday it has appointed Jin Jeonghee, former head of the US operations of local rivals Pearl Abyss Corp. and Kakao Games Corp., as chief executive of NC America, its North America unit.

Alongside the appointment, NCSOFT has tapped Lim Wonki, its chief business management officer, as head of its Japanese and Taiwanese operations -- NC Japan and NC Taiwan -- to accelerate its global expansion.

Park Byungmoo, its co-CEO and private equity expert, will oversee NC West, another US arm. He is taking over from Yoon Songyee, NCSOFT’s former chief strategy officer and wife of founder and co-CEO Kim Taek-jin.

“With over 15 years of leadership experience in both Western and Korean gaming companies, she brings extensive expertise in game publishing and global business expansion in the Western market,” NCSOFT said in a statement, referring to the incoming CEO Jin.

NC America is a marketing and sales arm.

Jin said in the same statement: “I will do my utmost to ensure that NCSOFT’s game development capabilities and values are more widely recognized on the global stage and to help the company reach new heights.”

As South Korea’s first-generation videogame developer, NCSOFT gained popularity with massively multiplayer online role-playing games (MMORPGs) such as Lineage, AION, Blade & Soul and Guild Wars in the 2000s.

With its blockbuster MMORPGs losing their appeal, however, it has streamlined US operations, laying off about 20% of its US-based employees last year.

Now it is seeking to increase its game portfolio with various genres and release games on multiple platforms to lure young gamers.

With regional offices in North America, Europe, Japan and Taiwan, NCSOFT has built its global network in over 60 countries.

Last week, it announced the investment of $3.5 million in Swedish game startup Moon Rover Games as the sole participant in its seed funding round.

In the second quarter, NCSOFT posted a 74.9% fall to 8.8 billion won ($6.4 million) in operating profit from the year prior with revenue down 16.2% to 368.9 billion won.

But its net profit shot up 132.8% to 71.1 billion won over the same period.

On August 28, it is slated to launch its new switching role-playing game Hoyeon in Korea, Japan and Taiwan.

On Sept. 17, NCSOFT's latest MMORPG Throne and Liberty will make its global debut in collaboration with Amazon Games.

Write to Ju-Hyun Lee at deep@hankyung.com
 

Yeonhee Kim edited this article.