[Click eStock] "Millie's Library, Over 60% Market Share... Expected to Benefit from Market Growth"

Daishin Securities stated on the 26th that regarding the e-book subscription service platform Millieoseojae, "Securing over 60% market share in the domestic reading platform market, which is still in the early growth stage, will act as a factor that increases the benefit intensity during the future market growth phase."

Researcher Lee Seok-young of Daishin Securities said, "Last year, Millieoseojae's sales amounted to 56.6 billion KRW, a 23% increase compared to the previous year, and operating profit rose 149% to 10.4 billion KRW." He added, "Since its establishment in 2017, rapid external growth has continued. It is positive that after turning profitable in 2022, the company succeeded in improving its margin last year," and evaluated, "Although solid external growth is expected this year, profit growth is likely to be limited due to costs incurred from entering new businesses."

As of March last year, the sales proportion by channel was 61.9% from individual customers (B2C), 7.4% from corporate customers (B2B), and 29.3% from partnership customers (B2BC). Researcher Lee said, "Since its establishment in 2017, the number of actual subscribers has continuously increased, and as of the end of the third quarter last year, it is estimated to be about 710,000," adding, "The re-subscription rate recorded 87.6%, showing an upward trend since 2020." More than 160,000 contents are being supplied through partnerships with about 2,500 publishers.

Researcher Lee explained, "Unlike online video services and music streaming, which have entered the maturity stage, the subscription-based reading platform market is still in the early growth stage," and said, "To ensure stable growth, continuous investment in content is underway, and the platform has secured superiority over competitors in terms of the number of contents, bestseller acquisition rate, and new release acquisition rate. It is judged that high-quality content is leading to an increase in actual subscribers."

He added, "In the first half of this year, we plan to launch a platform targeting the web novel (romance genre) market worth about 470 billion KRW," and said, "We have secured 40 out of the top 100 domestic authors by number of views. With the goal of activating subscriber inflow through weekly original new releases, marketing plans will target Millieoseojae subscribers and telecommunication company bundling customers."