Korea is the world’s sixth largest market in terms of online users and the most wired nation with almost every household (15.09 million) connected to high-speed Internet as of end July 2008.
Yet US Internet giant Google has often struggled to gain considerable market share in the East Asian online space, due to a relatively small base of user generated content in comparison with its local competitors.
Google Korea has announced its acquisition of Tatter and Company (TNC), a Korean blog tool developer, known among Korean bloggers for their “Textcube” platform. Further details were not disclosed, according to Chang Won-Kim, TNC’s Co-chief executive on his personal blog.
TNC is well known for its signature blogging tool, Tattertools, and Eolin, a backend data framework for distributing, syndicating, and monetizing user-created content.
Google launched its Korean operations in 2004 but has been struggling to increase its presence in the search market that’s almost completely dominated by local firms Naver.com, Daum.net and Nate. Naver is owned by homegrown tech giant NHN Corp., No. 19 on this year’s BusinessWeek Asia 50.
After eight years of Korean-language search service, Google accounts for less than 2.5% of search page views in Korea. That compares with 74% for Naver, which is expected to earn about $580 million in search-related ads this year.
To tackle the growth deadlock, Google opened a research and development center in South Korea in 2006 and unveiled a localized user interface in May last year.
