[Asia Economy Reporter Yoo Hyun-seok] The stock price of Eastsoft, a national software (SW) company, has been on an upward trend since the beginning of this month. Amid the domestic stock market frenzy to find metaverse beneficiary stocks, expectations are reflected that Eastsoft can secure a solid position in the upcoming metaverse world based on core virtual human technology and augmented reality (AR) functions.
As of 1:26 PM on the 26th, Eastsoft was trading at 17,900 KRW, up 2.58% (450 KRW) compared to the previous trading day.
Eastsoft provides services to over 30 million customers including corporations, governments, and individuals with its representative national utility software 'ALZip' and other ALTools such as 'ALToolbar', 'ALPDF', and 'ALCapture'. Recently, to respond to COVID-19, it developed ‘TeamUP 3.0’, a collaboration solution facilitating remote and telecommuting work, securing about 20,000 corporate clients in sectors such as finance, healthcare, and pharmaceuticals. The software division has steadily grown its revenue by an average of 17.1% annually over the past four years, serving as a cash cow. Even in the traditionally slow first quarter, sales increased to 8.06 billion KRW due to growth in ALYac and ALTools license sales and partnership advertising revenue, up 21.8% year-on-year.
Building on this stable cash cow, Eastsoft is exploring new business opportunities in AI and AR sectors. In April, Eastsoft introduced a virtual announcer based on its core virtual human technology. By AI learning of a specific person's video, it can synthesize not only the same speech patterns, intonation, and voice but also the face, expressions, and movements, replicating the real person identically. Since it synthesizes an existing person, inputting only the script allows the virtual human to replace the real person.
A company official said when introducing the AI announcer in April, "As the metaverse emerges, virtual characters and avatars are gaining attention in the content market. We believe that expressing people more humanly and making them move with vitality based on AI technology will positively impact the content ecosystem." He added, "Eastsoft wants to play a significant role in providing high-quality and beneficial content going forward."
Eastsoft expects to expand virtual human services in various fields such as weathercasters, trainers, customer service representatives, and concierges. It has already partnered with education specialist company Hunet and entered virtual instructor development last month.
It has also secured technology to create virtual humans that do not exist in reality. Using AI learning technology on facial data, it can generate virtual humans that do not exist in the world.
ROUNZ, an eyewear shopping platform operated through its subsidiary DeepEye, draws attention as it takes its first step into metaverse commerce. ROUNZ applies world-class facial recognition commercialization technology and 3D rendering technology to its mobile app, providing AR shopping through virtual eyewear fitting, and recorded sales of 5.3 billion KRW last year. Apple cited ROUNZ as a representative AR app in Korea on its official website as a prime example of AR technology application.
Researcher Kang Kyung-geun of NH Investment & Securities explained, "ROUNZ was the first in Korea to develop eyewear virtual fitting service by combining deep learning-based facial recognition technology and 3D rendering technology. Customers can try on over 4,000 eyewear products from about 100 brands directly through their smartphones."
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