NHN Cloud aims to offer specialized AI services for e-commerce customers

NHN Corp. Chief Executive Officer Kim Dong-hoon [Photo provided by NHN]

South Korea’s NHN Cloud is preparing a platform-as-a-service (PaaS) that provides a platform-like development environment for companies that want to build generative artificial intelligence services like ChatGPT, according to the company’s Chief Executive Officer Kim Dong-hoon.

“In the heavily funded race for generative AI, it is not strategically appropriate for NHN to offer the same level of software-as-a-service (SaaS) as big tech companies like Google,” Kim told Maeil Business Newspaper in a recent interview.

During the interview conducted on the company’s first anniversary as an independent entity from NHN Corp., Kim shared his thoughts on a roadmap for NHN Cloud’s AI business as a cloud provider amid the big tech race for generative AI technology sparked by Open AI’s ChatGPT.

NHN Cloud, which was spun off from NHN in April last year to stand on its own as a cloud company, has shown remarkable growth over the past year, having successfully attracted its first external investment and becoming a unicorn company with a corporate value of 1 trillion won ($747 million).

NHN Cloud’s parent company, NHN, was formerly known as NHN Entertainment before changing its name in 2019. NHN Entertainment was formed in 2000 when NAVER.com and Hangame merged, and then split in 2013 into NAVER to focus on internet portal business and NHN Entertainment on computer game business.

NHN Cloud posted sales of 160 billion won last year and it aims to reach 210 billion won this year.

“Since becoming an independent company, we have generated more than 75 percent of our revenue outside of NHN,” Kim said. “Currently, we have more than 400 business customers, which is 70 percent more than the number of customers we had right after our business launch.” Among them, there are more than 100 regionally based customers who are working with NHN Cloud, three times more than before.

NHN Cloud is doing well in markets where it is difficult for foreign cloud brands to enter, such as the public and financial sectors. Last year, it ranked first in the public sector cloud conversion business with a 39 percent share. In addition, in the private cloud market, which is dominated by foreign companies, NHN Cloud has stood out by securing a number of new customers in the financial sector, including KB Financial Group and Shinhan Investment Corp.

“We are building tangible results in the financial and securities sector, such as signing a memorandum of understanding (MOU) with Shinhan Investment,” Kim emphasized.

NHN Cloud is focusing on strengthening AI business as its future growth driver. Since around 2016, the company has been expanding its service-oriented AI, or AI-as-a-service (AIaaS) offerings.

As a new business project, NHN Cloud is conducting research and development on Private ChatGPT Service for B2B. NHN Cloud believes that it is competitive in cloud solutions for finance, gaming, e-commerce and education, as well as the public sector. Companies in these areas are the target for its customized platform-as-a-service (PaaS) business.

“Unlike other providers that are based on proprietary sources, NHN Cloud has adopted OpenStack, an open standard cloud computing platform, and has strengths in multi-cloud support. We will build on these capabilities to strengthen our enterprise-specific AI solutions with a focus on high compatibility,” Kim said.