
Daum Kakao Will Acquire the Path and Path Talk Apps - misiti3780
https://medium.com/the-road/a-new-chapter-for-path-c521e039f261
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thewhizkid
The company has not been acquired, just the Path and Path Talk apps. I
actually do not understand that part - what exactly does the company hope to
do with Kong? How is the company supporting 40+ headcount now?

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nedwin
Well they just got a cash injection from selling Path & Path Talk so I can
imagine that should help support 40+ headcount for a little while. Along with
the $25m they raised a year ago.

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joelrunyon
Anyone know what Daum Kakao does?

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sungeuns
I'm Korean so let me explain about the company. Daum KaKao is combined company
of Daum communications & KaKao. Daum Communications is an internet company,
mainly focused on internet portal service like Yahoo!. (It is second largest
portal in Korea, the first is Naver) KaKao made a KaKaoTalk, which is dominant
messaging app in South Korea. Naver, which is the number one internet company
in Korea has both of internet portal and messaging app (LINE, which is
dominant messaging app in Japan and Taiwan) so Daum and KaKao are merged in
2014. Daum KaKao now focusing on mobile service since it has dominant
messaging app in Korea. The reason why they acquired Path is they want to
enter Southeast Asia market, which Naver and Tencent WeChat already have
largest portion. (Daum KaKao said that they acquired Path because of
Indonesian market. Path has many users in Indonesia)

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wingerlang
LINE is also the main app in Thailand.

How come KaKaoTalk is dominant in Korea when Naver (LINE) is the bigger
company? If you know.

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sungeuns
Yes, LINE already has many users in Spain and other Southeast Asia countries.
KakaoTalk is launched at 2010, before the smartphone market is matured. At the
first time KaKaoTalk was made, Samsung and LG (both of them are Korean tech
giant) dramatically produce many Android device, but there's no wonderful
messaging app. (WhatsApp is not an free model, and other messaging app's
quality it not that good) After KaKaotalk have gained lots of popularity,
Naver made two messaging app named NaverTalk and LINE. NaverTalk based on
Korean market and they failed since KakaoTalk already occupy all the
smartphone. But LINE is based on Japan and they succeed, so Naver threw out
NaverTalk and focused on LINE. At this time, Daum (before merged with KaKao)
made messaging app named MyPeople. They have many users in Korea, but didn't
make a profit because of KaKaoTalk. And MyPeople also removed from the market
after Daum merged with Kakao.

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wingerlang
I see, thanks.

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dba7dba
S Korea had some surprising early social network services before myspace ( est
2003) or facebook (2004). Cyworld (est 1999) was very popular social network
service until it stagnated to the point where it now has about 40 or so
employees only. Afaik, pretty much anyone with a computer in S Korea had an
account at one point. Btw, I'm not suggesting myspace or facebook were
copycats at all.

I'm sure there's some other social network service that was launched before
all of the above but just never got lucky enough to grow.

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ryandetzel
So the board/investors approved this and since it does nothing for them Path,
Inc. has to have a better plan going forward. Their investors have been on a
roller coaster ride for a while. I wonder if they recouped what they paid for
TalkTo in the deal?

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minimaxir
Path also made the same post on their official blog:
[http://blog.path.com/post/120147299377/a-new-chapter-for-
pat...](http://blog.path.com/post/120147299377/a-new-chapter-for-path)

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Handwash
From this acquisition, I just hope that Path won't turn into Kakao/LINE-like
application, where they offer useless stickers, and try to look 'cute'.

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alariccole
I hope I don't ruin the joke by asking, is this a joke?

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balladeer
It's good to know people still use Path. It sounded like a good app before
mail/call spammed the shit out of almost everyone I knew.

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fearless
Path's failure is a fitting reminder of the likely outcome of making your key
metrics friendships and moments rather than revenue. No doubt this is just one
of many overfunded social apps that will fall into the abyss this year.

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NhanH
This is about as empty as criticism could get. If a company is solely focus on
revenue then it's "short sighted and make bad product". Otherwise they're
"over funded without business plan". You can't win anyway huh?

I have no idea on why any of those social/ mobile apps is useful and I have
never used Path either. But please keep the no substance criticism to a
minimum please.

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tomasien
The title needs to be changed to be more clear, Path and Path talk the apps
were acquired, the company is going to produce other apps and support an app
they already have in the market called "Kong".

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dang
Ok, we changed the title.

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tomasien
Thanks!

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alaskamiller
Signals the official end of web 2.0 to me. A whimper instead of a bang.

Path is so web 2.0 and the worst look to have this year is to be old when
we're at the beginning of a third wave full of youngsters that wouldn't be
caught dead trying to update their path timeline.

Path Talk would have been an expensive land war that required a big sales army
to win over one small shop at a time.

So if Path is to Facebook then Kong is to Snapchat.

If Marky Mark can't buy Snapchat then buying a second-run owned by a former
insider ain't too bad either.

That's the end game.

Or, just rely on that Martha Stewart of Silicon Valley money to finally roll
in.

