Kakao Mobility is entering the phone call market with '1577 surrogate driving', the No. 1 service in the surrogate driving industry.
The surrogate driving industry strongly opposes large corporations, calling them 'killing small businesses'.
According to the surrogate operation industry and the IT industry, CMNP, a subsidiary of Kakao Mobility, recently established Korea Drive, which operates '1577 surrogate operation', and 'K-drive', a new corporation, and transfers the 1577 surrogate operation service as of today (1st).
Changmin Lee, Kakao Mobility's chief financial officer, will be the CEO of K-Drive.
Kakao Mobility did not disclose the exact stake, but the industry believes that Kakao Mobility has secured a 50% stake in the new corporation.
A Kakao Mobility official said, "We are not acquiring a 100% stake, but decided to establish a new corporation and participate in some of the shares while Korea Drive and CMNP were discussing collaboration plans." There are many companies, and if there is a request from the company, we plan to build a win-win model in various ways.”
Kakao Mobility is expected to try to incorporate phone calls into the platform through a new corporation.
Kakao Mobility introduced a surrogate driving service in 2016, but in the surrogate driving market, phone calls account for more than 80% of the use so far.
Ride-sharing platform Tada also experienced a decrease in demand due to COVID-19 and 'phone calls'Due to a barrier, we have recently decided to terminate the surrogate driving service.
Kakao Mobility recently launched the 'Kakao T Phone Call' service along with the acquisition of 1577 surrogate operation.
This is a service that connects some of the phone calls to the Kakao T agent or allows 1577 agents to receive phone calls through the Kakao T agent app.
Existing agency operators are strongly opposed to this move by Kakao Mobility, saying that it is a 'market invasion' by large corporations.
An official of the Korea Association of Drivers Association, made up of surrogate driving companies, said, "The current situation is already difficult because sales have shrunk by a quarter due to COVID-19. "It is a situation in which companies feel powerless at the movement of large corporations to dominate the market with capital."
Following the recent application to the Shared Growth Committee to designate the proxy driving business as a suitable business for small and medium-sized enterprises, the Korea Agency for Drivers Association is planning to file a petition to prevent large companies from entering the phone call market and to ban excessive cash-for-money promotions by large companies.