쿠팡의 초기투자사 굿워터캐피탈의 에릭 킴이 전하는 ‘전 세계 기업가들이 쿠팡을 통해 배울 수 있는 3가지 교훈’ 쿠팡의 초기 투자사 굿워터캐피탈(Goodwater Capital)의 공동창립자이자 매니징 파트너인 에릭 킴(Eric Kim)이 전 세계 기업가들이 쿠팡을 통해 배울 수 있는 교훈 세 가지를 공유했다. 에릭 킴은 한국의 대표 유니콘 기업인 쿠팡, 카카오, 토스 등의 주요 초기 투자자이며, 뮤지컬리(Musical.ly-Tik Tok), 당근마켓, 에버리웰(EverlyWell), 스푼라디오, 심플헬스(Simple Health), 모모(MoMo), 젠디트(Xendit)의 투자를 리드한 바 있다. 미국 실리콘밸리에 기반을 둔 굿워터캐피탈은 12개국 이상의…

For the past 14 years, Eric Kim has been racking up a lot of global airline miles. Though his day job is a venture capitalist, Eric joked, “if being an airline passenger were a sport, I think I could enter the Olympics…I’ve learned to sleep in some weird positions.” During any given week, Eric might be in San Francisco, Seoul, New York, Shanghai, Singapore, or Vancouver. When asked if all the travel…

Since beginning in 2012 as beLAUNCH, beGLOBAL has grown and successfully concluded the 7 startup conferences in Korea and U.S. On the 15th October, the event’s U.S. annual event will be hosted at the ‘The Village’ in San Francisco.  In the ecosystem of startups, beGLOBAL San Francisco 2015 provides invaluable networking opportunities between Asia and U.S . So for budding startups and investors looking at the next top technology startup from Asia, the following provide three reasons why you should attend this event.  Key…

Since beginning in 2012 as beLAUNCH, beGLOBAL has grown and successfully concluded the seventh startup conference beGLOBAL in both Korea and the U.S. To date, the event has been attended by 15,000 people from over 25 countries. To more than 4,000 startups, the event has become a global networking platform. beGLOBAL SF 2015 will be held in San Francisco, on the 15th of October and will provide an opportunity for Korean domestic startups…

SoftBank Corp. (“SoftBank”) and Coupang today announced a definitive agreement under which a subsidiary of SoftBank will invest $1 billion in Coupang, the largest and fastest growing standalone e-commerce player in Korea. The investment is expected to close at the beginning of July, 2015 and will bring the total amount of funding raised by Coupang over the past year to nearly $1.5 billion. This funding will fuel Coupang’s innovations in its end-to-end fulfillment service, same-day…

쿠팡(대표 김범석)이 소프트뱅크로부터 10억달러(1조 1000억원)의 투자를 유치했다. 쿠팡은 2010년 창업 후 지난해 5월 미국 세쿼이어캐피탈 1억달러, 11월 미국 블랙록 3억달러 투자에 이어 이번 소프트뱅크의 대규모 투자 유치에 성공했다. (현재까지 주요 투자자는 Softbank, Illuminate Ventures, LaunchTime, Rose Park Advisors, Greenoaks Capital Management, Sequoia Capital 등이 있다) 이에 쿠팡은 지난 1년 동안 총 14억달러(1조 5500억원)의 투자를 받아글로벌 이커머스 기업으로의 성장성을 대내외로부터 인정 받았다. 쿠팡은 소프트뱅크가 이번 투자를 결정한 배경으로 ▲전국 단위의 물류센터를 구축하고 배송 전담직원…

This year, Coupang reached the top of the social commerce game with two major investments. In order to chase Coupang ‘WEMAKEPRICE’ announced their buyout of Ticket Monster (TMON). There was reserved bidding session for TMON until the morning of 31st. 10 fund manager companies including Carlyle, Affinity,  KKR, Anchor Partners, and WEMAKEPRICE participated in this session. TMON came out on 2010 as the very first domestic social commerce platform. It was purchased…

올 한해, 두 번의 큰 투자를 유치해 소셜커머스 업계 1위로 올라선 쿠팡을 추적하기 위한 위메이크프라이스(이하 위메프)의 티몬 인수에 대한 공식 입장이 발표됐다. 위메프는 31일 오전까지 진행되는 티몬 인수 예비 입찰에 참여했다. 칼라일, 어피니티, KKR, 앵커파트너스 등 국내외 사모펀드 운용사 10곳 역시 입찰에 참여했다. 티몬은 2010년 국내 최초로 설립된 소셜커머스 플랫폼으로 지난해 1월 미국 그루폰 그룹이 2,750억 원에 인수한 후 1년 만에 다시 매물로 시장에 나왔다. 현재 쿠팡의 가입자수는 1,235만 명, 위메프는 1,234만…

As reported by Coupang’s President Bom Kim, his four year old ecommerce company has surpassed monthly turnover of 200 billion won (a little shy of $200 million USD). While the comapny started life as a daily deals site, it rapidly became an ecommerce focused enterprise, escaping the global downturn in daily deals that put market leader Groupon into major trouble this year. Kim now sees his largest rival as Amazon, which is…

[This article was originally published on Forbes] I was in Asia last week to attend a Demo Day for startups that participated in a two month acceleration program through DEV Korea where I serve as a principal. These companies had split their time between New York and Seoul in order to gain a global perspective that could be applied to their ventures while they were still in a formative stage. This is…

Social Commerce In Korea Is A hot Topic These Days With Coupang’s Recent $300 Million USD Fundraise – Here’s a Review of the Market from our friends at Business Korea. In May 2010 social commerce arrived in Korea, thanks to local player, TMON. In the same year two other local players also started operations, Coupang and. Four years later, three companies are still operating at a loss, engaged in fierce competition. Coupang has…

“We want to be the Amazon of Korea. We are the largest online retailer here, and we’re one of the most well-funded tech companies in Korea.” CEO of Coupang, Bom Kim in an interview with Forbes To accelerate this growth Coupang has just announced another huge funding round, worth $300 million USD, from BlackRock Private Equity Partners. This follows fast on the heals of another $100 million USD round led around five months…

소셜 커머스 기업 쿠팡이 세계 최대 자산운용사인 미국 블랙록(BlackRock)의 주도로 총 3억달러(한화 약 3천 322억 원)의 투자를 유치했다고 오늘 밝혔다. 이번 투자는 한국 전자상거래 업계 사상 최대규모로, 블랙록의 주도 아래 웰링턴, 그린옥스, 로즈파크 등의 투자 기관이 참여했다. 쿠팡은 지난 5월 미국의 세쿼이아 캐피털로부터 1억 달러(한화 약 1천 26억 원)의 투자를 유치한 바 있다. 당시 쿠팡은 1조 원 이상의 기업가치를 평가받았으나, 이번 투자를 통해 가치는 20억 달러를 넘어설 예정이라고 월스트리트저널은 추정했다. 덧붙여 이번…

Last December, Aileen Lee from Cowboy Ventures, identified 39 software startups that have reached valuations of over $1 Billion, and grouped them under the moniker of The Unicorn Club, in her landmark TechCrunch post. Since then, software startups with valuations of over $1 Billion are being commonly called “Unicorns” in Silicon Valley and worldwide. On the conclusion of a second very successful beGLOBAL 2014, where ten Korean startups featured in Silicon Valley, we…

This article was co-authored by Alan McGlade (Digital Entertainment Ventures) and Nathan Millard (beSUCCESS) and appeared on Forbes on July 18 2014. As little as five years ago Korea’s startup scene was undistinguished, but now the nation has taken an important step towards establishing itself as a key technology hub in the Asia Pacific region and an essential partner for global investors and tech businesses. Two young Korean startups have gained the…

Coupang, a leader in next generation e-commerce based in Seoul Korea, has raised $100 million in financing led by Sequoia Capital, with participation by existing investors Greenoaks Capital Management, Rose Park’s Disruptive Innovation Fund and LaunchTime. This investment comes at a time when rumours about a possible IPO at some point in 2015 abound in the local Korean startup ecosystem, and follows in the same week that Korea’s other ‘mega-startup,’ Kakao Corp….

Korea, once referred to as the ‘Land of the Morning Calm,’ is emerging as one of the key startup hubs in Asia. I have witnessed firsthand the exponential pace of change in this once conservative and shy nation over the last ten years, and I am encouraged by the hunger with which local founders are embracing the challenge and opportunity presented by entrepreneurship. As predictable and arduous corporate careers begin to lose…

Original data for this post taken from an article in Korean on Under The Radar, with additional editing from Hugh Yoon and Nathan Millard: Under The Radar, a prominent IT and Startup focused blog, recently published a top 10 list of venture backed enterprises in Korea. Not surprisingly, Kakao was placed number one in the list by a wide margin. In Korea, unlike most other venture ecosystems around the world, success is…

Preparation for beLAUNCH, Korea’s top event for tech entrepreneurs in Asia, is well under way. It’s now time to break under the surface of the event to uncover the content that will cement the third annual beLAUNCH in Seoul as one of the stand-out events in the startup calender in Asia. A good conference relies on top quality content crafted carefully around a superb line-up of world-class speakers. Below is a highlight…

Kakao Corp., developers of Korea’s favorite messaging service and social platform, Kakao Talk, will be listing its stock publicly next May. This follows the recent news that SundayToz also successfully listed its stock in August 2013, and demonstrates further growth in the domestic tech industry, that has been attracting much attention in the international press attention recently. What’s more interesting though is the potential opportunity that Facebook has presented following today’s news that…