[Asia Economy Reporter Seungjin Lee] Between Us, the operator of the couple application 'Between,' will be merged into the interactive content production company Thingsflow. Both companies are subsidiaries of Krafton, and this merger is expected to expand their content business.
On the 18th, Between Us announced to users that it will be merged into Thingsflow as of June 1, and accordingly, personal information will be transferred.
Krafton established its subsidiary Between Us in March last year and acquired the couple messenger Between business division from VCNC. At that time, Krafton stated that it acquired Between to expand its B2C (business-to-consumer) business. Between has gained high popularity as a couple messenger, recording 1.2 million monthly active users and over 35 million global downloads.
Thingsflow, which will absorb and merge Between Us, was acquired by Krafton in June last year. Thingsflow is a well-known startup to the public through its character IP-based chat content platform 'HelloBot.' The cumulative app users of HelloBot, launched in February 2018, surpassed 4 million as of last year.
Krafton is known to have planned the merger of Between Us since the time it acquired Thingsflow. After acquiring Between, Krafton changed its privacy policy and has been conducting user data research by collecting texts and information entered by members. Based on this, Krafton has been strengthening its artificial intelligence (AI) research and development (R&D), and it expects to generate various synergy effects through this merger.
Meanwhile, Krafton is accelerating the diversification of its business portfolio beyond the gaming sector. This year, Krafton invested in CuckooFM, India's largest audio content platform. In addition, in February, Krafton invested in Seoul Auction Blue, an affiliate of the domestic art auction company 'Seoul Auction,' and its subsidiary XbyBlue, collaborating on NFT avatar production and sales.
At the regular shareholders' meeting held in March, Krafton CEO Changhan Kim stated, "In 2022, Krafton will secure sustainable growth engines and competitiveness by intensifying research and investment in deep learning, VR, and Web 3.0·NFT based on its core capability of game development."
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