SK Telecom's Cyworld exits Europe, makes new investments
2008/03/09 12:44Korea Times reports that SK Telecom has decided to close their Cyworld Europe site that was a partnership with Deutsche Telekom:
SK Communications spent 5.2 billion won setting up Cyworld Europe, a joint venture with Deutsche Telekom. The Korean company held a 50.2 percent share. Shin said that the emergence of Myspace's German language service was the biggest blow to Cyworld there.
The company has five other foreign operations in the form of direct subsidiaries or joint ventures. Among them, Vietnam and Taiwan have good prospects because of Korean TV stars' popularity in those countries.
For some background, you can read about Cyworld's 2006 launch in America from Business 2.0.
While they are closing their Cyworld site in Germany, SK announced several new investments recently:
11th Street: A new online shopping mall in Korea and China
Mobile Money Ventures: Partnership with Citigroup to sell mobile banking and payment services in North America and Asia.
"SK Telecom will be developing the mobile banking software and hardware systems for Citibank customers in Hong Kong and major cities in the United States first. ``This is not an exclusive deal, so we will be able to sell the platform to other banks and mobile carriers in other countries later on,'' said SK Telecom spokeswoman Cindy Kang.
After testing the mobile banking system, the firm will then move onto mobile payment and electronic coupon services, Kang said. The joint venture will be run by Steven Kietz, who oversaw e-commerce and direct banking initiatives at Citi."
Taihe Rei Music: Acquiring a 42.2% stake in the Chinese record label
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