Naver, Kakao call for equal footing with Facebook, Google in Korea

South Korea's information technology firms Naver and Kakao complained against the government for discriminatory policies and demanding it to ensure fair competition with foreign IT firms.

According to Kakao CEO Yeo Min-soo, regulations on the platform business need refinement to create fair competition between local and international firms, noting that different regulations and penalties apply to each group.

Naver CEO Han Sung-sook said local firms trail their foreign counterparts Facebook, Google and Alibaba, in engineering workforce and funding by at least 20 to 30 times, saying they would never be able to compete against any of them one-on-one.

Han insists that there shouldn't be restrictions solely put on them just because they are local.

The two CEOs expressed their concerns during the Digital Economy Innovation Study Forum at the National Assembly in Seoul.

Zigbang CEO Ahn Sung-woo, Kakao Pay CEO Ryu Young-joon, and Woowa Brothers CEO Kim Beom-joon, participated in the forum.

Both Yeo and Han also emphasized their firms' contribution to promoting mutual growth with local small and mid-sized companies.

Currently, Kakao sells emojis created by 7,500 local artists, with the top 50 most popular sets generating sales of 1 billion won.

Naver has been investing in domestic startup companies in the last few years, and it has opened a shopping platform called "Smart Store" for budding entrepreneurs to sell their products.

Kim Kwang-su, a professor at the Computing College of Sungkyunkwan University, stressed that for the Digital New Deal initiative to work, the government has to suggest a clear vision and invest money while letting the private sector do business.