Naver Webtoon gears up to become global storytelling platform

SEONGNAM, Gyeonggi Province -- After building a webtoon creator-friendly environment and expanding business overseas, Naver Webtoon hopes to become a top global content platform by creating a new system to coexist with various creative content industries.

“The PPS model was first introduced in 2013 and we have achieved outstanding performances since then. Webtoons became the major source for TV dramas, movies, music and more. Our company plans to become No. 1 storytelling platform via a new version of the PPS model, which aims for active cooperation with various industries,” said Naver Webtoon CEO Kim Jun-koo in a press conference in Seongnam, Gyeonggi Province, Tuesday morning, referring to its "Page Profit Share" model.

Page Profit Share is a model first developed by Naver Webtoon that allows writers to earn profit beyond manuscript fees, including for advertisements, paid content and intellectual property.

Kim announced that content sales in 2013 increased from 23.2 billion won ($17.4 million) to 2.25 trillion won in 2022, about an increase of 87 times over a decade.

He added that a total of 904 webtoon series recorded more than 100 million won in content sales in 2022, while only a single project marked such a performance in 2013.

“I believe Naver Webtoon will be competing with other renowned creative content companies like Netflix, YouTube and TikTok,” Kim said.

“Webtoon is a special form of creative content, because it carries strong IP, passionate fandom and digital data in a single format. From a webtoon project, we can identify the target users, their level of interest and other meaningful information. These are crucial data when expanding the IPs,” Kim said.

“I am certain that such information can invite other filmmakers, production companies, studios and other businesses to look up for interesting content,” Kim said, adding that his company will continue efforts to deliver mesmerizing contents in various forms, including games, videos, animations, print publishing and music.

Naver Webtoon seeks to offer various programs to the amateur creators to easily serialize their works and receive meaningful data to develop their performances.

Meanwhile, the South Korean tech giant's digital comics platform hopes to increase the number of webtoon series recording more than 100 million won in content sales from 904 to 2,000 by 2028.