Taggle is a photo management application which integrates hashtags (#), a term which is familiar to Instagram users to create an simple and efficient way to mange photos. The company is among 6 companies with early stage accelerating programs with Silicon Valley’s SOS Ventures.  Taggle through the ‘Chinaccelerator’ program has secured an investment of US$95k (KRW 110m). Taggle makes it easy to organize photos through a their daily reminder function GTD (‘Getting…

Jienem, a guesthouse accommodation service specialist and catering for Chinese tourists has received an investment of US$200k (KRW 240m) from Angel Club an Accredited Investor (AI). In August last year, the company also received an early stage investment from specialist China marketing company, ‘On China’. Jienem provides an easy accommodation booking service that allows users to select accommodation in the categories of fashion, glamping, traditional Korean house, lodges, and boutique guest houses….

China Da the operator of China Tan, a digital Chinese language teaching service has secured investment from Mirae Assets, Softbank Ventures and Coolidge Corner Investment. This investment is the second investment for China Da, which secured an initial investment last year from Nexplat Korea, Lake Investment, Softbank Venture and Coolidge Corner Investment. Within one year of launching, the number of users has increased each month by 20 per cent. In creating their educational content,…

General Bio, a company known to be socially and environmentally responsible has received a total of US$4.6m (KRW 5.3b) investment from Mirae Assets, L&S Venture Capital, Coolidge Corner Investment and SJ Investment Partners. The company which kicked off in 2007 is a producer of organic laundry detergents and fabric conditioners. The R&D oriented company has continued to develop products that are environmentally friendly and biodegradable. Although the socially responsible status is noteworthy,…

Hello Nature, an online fresh produce platform connects producers directly with their consumers. On the 30th December, the company revealed that a ‘Series B’ investment amount of US$2.1m (KRW 2.5b) was confirmed from GS Home Shopping and Fast Track Asia. This is the second successful investment into Hello Nature following last year’s investment of US$1.6m (KRW 1.9b) by Softbank Ventures and Mirae Assets. The investment was made possible following the rapid growth…

Dining Code a Korean startup providing restaurant recommendation services has secured US$1.7m (KRW 2b) investment from Posco Technical Investment, ID Ventures, Seoul Investment Partners, HBIC and Magellan Technical Investment. The company had also received a seed investment amount of US$170k (KRW 200m) from K Cube Ventures in July 2014. Dining Code sources reliable restaurant data from tens of thousands of different blogs. The information used by the platform removes biases of personal…

23 December – Buzzvil a startup based in Seoul Korea and the creators of a mobile lockscreen advertising platform have received a series B investment of US$11.2m (KRW 13b). The investment comes from five (5) separate investors comprised of LB investment, KTB network, POSCO Ventures, Company K Partners, and ES Investment. This is the second investments for Buzzvil after their US$3.4m (KRW4b) investment from Softbank Investment two (2) years ago in December…

Huge institutions, archaic systems and lots of money at stake. These are the conditions that have brought tech entrepreneurs to the wildly exciting and growing arena of financial tech.Both venture capitalists and Wall Street are rushing into the space, investing $10.5 billion in fintech startups during the first nine months of 2015, up from $3.9 billion in the same period last year. and For Korea, If the government were willing to lower barriers…

Daliworks, an unique IoT platform service provider in Korea, announced an investment of US$ 2 million from Strategic investor. Strategic investor has made this investment to Daliworks for its exponential growth in IoT cloud platform, ThingPlus(Thing+), and will expand its IoT market with differentiated product portfolio and competitiveness. Daliworks IoT platform will expand its business to global market by providing SaaS based IoT platform and ready to use and customer friendly service….

Goldman Sachs, the global leader in investment banking is joining the list of foreign investors interested in Korean Startup. Goldman Sachs have invested a total of US$33m (KRW 38b) in ZigBang the leading real estate mobile application in Korea with a 70% market dominance. Following their launch in 2010, ZigBang secured a US$23m (KRW 27b) investment lead by Blue Run Ventures. This latest investment from Goldman Sachs will be used to towards…

Encored Technology has secured a US$10m (KRW 1.17b) investment from QSP which is run by Soros Fund Management. The company is a specialist in Internet of Things (IoT) and big data analysis with a particular focus on technology that assists in energy conservation. Encored Technology will utilize the investments towards developing their market presence in USA and Japan. A key factor for QSP in this investment was Encored Energy’s big data technology…

Cautious optimism abounds across Korea’s fast-growing startup scene. Following a national policy shift that has recognized the realities and opportunities of the present age, Korean entrepreneurial talent is finally receiving the level of public sector support needed for success. The export-oriented growth formula that helped Korean conglomerates drive economic development for decades following the Korean War is unlikely to continue its impressive historical returns, and the Park administration has sought to replace…

Withweb launched Withinnovation as a separate subsidiary in order to focus on the accommodation business. This strategic move seems to have worked given the company revealed on the 8th December that it had secured an investment of US$11m (KRW 13b) from Korea Investment Partners and Mirae Asset Venture investment. In April last year, Withinnovation began servicing the Korean motels with their O2O platform, GoodChoice (Korean ‘Yeo-Gi-O-Dae’ meaning ‘How is this place?’). In total,…

Nthing, a developer of Agriculture IoT (Internet of Things) that connects Plants to People has recently secured investment of US$1.7m (KRW 2b) from KDB Bank (Korea Development Bank). The aim for Nthing seems to be to connect all things ranging from ‘things to things’, ‘things to people’, and ‘people to people’. Their ‘plant to people’ connection solution is named Planty. Planty is a neat pot for plants that is just 170mm high…

2nd December 2015 – K Cube Ventures, investment specialists in mobile, internet and technology have invested US$690k (KRW 800m) into mobile game developer Affinity. Affinity is the developer of mobile game Historia. The Affinity team were specially brought together by Song In Su, the previous director of Joy City, who sought to bring individuals with success in creating popular games. The key team members have an impressive combined experience in creating popular…

Collaboration tool startup ‘collabee’ announces that it has received pre-Series A investment led by Mega Investment and joined by Venture Square.  The undisclosed investment was finalised in November, 2015.  This is their second investment after their initial seed investment from Mashup Angels in May. Collabee aims to disrupt the current market that’s come to be so largely populated by messenger (eg., Slack) and task (eg., Asana) based collaboration tools. Collabee utilises the…

Social Network, a specialist platform servicing Korean trends (wave) has secured an investment of US$4.3m (KRW 5b) from Korea Investment Partners, Mirae Asset Investment, POSCO technical investment and Intellectual Ventures. In 2012, Social Network secured their early stage investment of the same amount from Travel Doctor, Shinhan Bank and Hong Kong’s Evo Revo. The total amount for investment is now close to US$9m (KRW 10b). Productions from Social Network includes; Sketchup, the top…

Mr Pic the operator of used car O2O (online to offline) service ‘ChutCha’ has secured an investment of US$1.3 (KRW 1.5b) from KDB Industry Bank. This investment follows MrPic’s success in July after securing US$1.3m (KRW 1.5b) three way investment from East Gate Partners, DSC Investment and Song Hyun Investment. This brings the yearly investment total to US$2.6m (KRW 3b). Mr Pic, debuted ‘ChutCha’ in January 2015 and has amassed more than 300…

Zitko, a Korean health care wearable device startup has received US$1m (KRW1.2b) investment from IBK Capital and SBA (Seoul Business Agency). This investment follows a recent investment from ‘The Creation Investment’ to bring total for recent investments to US$1.7m (KRW 2b). Zikto is a healthcare product that monitors walking steps and corrects body posture. After releasing their ‘Zikto Walk’ on the 5th of October, the company has received praise for the product’s design…

Chinese Venture Capital (德同资本)company, DT Capital have followed other VCs in the recent trend for Korean beauty products, with an investments into B2Link. This is the fourth investment into the company following investments from DSC Investment in September last year and January this year and an investment from another Chinese company, KTM Network in September. DT Capital have an impressive investment portfolio in over 200 global companies. Since being recognized by Forbes as…