Apple, Amazon eyes webtoon market led by Korean platforms

Naver Corp.‘s Line Manga and Kakao Corp.’s Piccoma [Courtesy of each company]

Apple Inc. has joined Amazon.com Inc. in the race to reach more customers in the global webtoon market which is led by South Korea’s Naver Corp. and Kakao Corp. who operate Line Manga and Piccoma, respectively, in the largest webtoon service market in the world in Japan.

Apple’s market entry is expected to expand the worldwide reach of Korea’s webtoon ecosystem, which has strong intellectual property competitiveness. But it also means fiercer competition for Naver and Kakao that are just now establishing themselves as webtoon platforms with monopolistic positions in the market.

According to sources on Thursday, Apple’s e-book platform, Apple Books, launched a webtoon page for Japanese users on April 14. Korean webtoon studio KENAZ will exclusively distribute content on Apple Books. KENAZ said it will provide Korean webtoon content to Apple exclusively by starting with the release of more than 20 original webtoon series in Japan.

Apple has reportedly been working for over three years to enter the webtoon platform market. Apple said it plans to produce more than 100 webtoon series, centering on 180 creators. Apple is considering its entry into the North American market after business explorations in Japan, said an industry insider familiar with the situation.

Earlier this month, Amazon, the world’s largest e-commerce company, launched a webtoon service in Japan under the name, Amazon Fliptoon. Sources said Amazon is sourcing content from Korean companies such as Kidari Studio and Lezhin Entertainment. Amazon has benchmarked the paid model used by Korean webtoon companies. If Apple and Amazon launch their webtoon platforms in North America after Japan, there can be a significant increase in opportunities for Korean webtoon producers.

The U.S. big tech companies are reportedly in contact with multiple Korean webtoon producers, offering more incentives to source competitive IP. Apple has a strong sales channel as it has built-in Apple Books on its devices such as iPhones and iPads.

The industry pays attention to the figure of paying users of webtoon platforms. Unlike Korea, where the market is already mature, the U.S. and Europe are in their early stages and have the potential to grow globally. South Korea has a paying user ratio of 26 percent, but it is only 10 percent in the global market. Moreover, recent webtoon content has a lot of potential for IP business expansion into movies and dramas.