Korean platform leader Kakao Corp. will leverage on its widening readers and viewers of its contents to expand e-commerce on a global scale.

According to the commerce industry on Tuesday, Kakao subsidiary Kakao Style has invited domestic fashion and cosmetics products retailers and developers to join “Zigzag Global”, its new commerce platform targeting overseas consumers. It aims to launch the global fashion-beauty marketplace platform in July.

Zigzag Global is a global version of Zigzag, a commerce platform operated by Croquis that Kakao acquired in April, and the new platform will be operated as a separate marketplace for foreign consumers. It will be first launched in North America and Japan next month before expanding to other countries.

Zigzag Global will offer bespoke global customer and marketing services as well as logistics service for its clients who are mostly small- and-medium sized Korean retailers that have not been able to reach out to overseas customers due to the lack of systems on a global sale. Kakao expects Zigzag Global to pave the way for exports of products by small- and medium-sized Korean fashion and beauty product sellers.

Kakao also hopes it can further expand its presence in the global market with the launch of the new global e-commerce platform after it has succeeded in building up global demand for its webtoon, web novel, music, and film services.

Kakao merged with Kakaocommerce last year, less than three years after the e-commerce subsidiary was spun off, to strengthen its commerce business. The platform giant then merged the fashion business of Kakaocommerce and Croquis to launch Kakao Style. In March this year, a “commerce committee” was established within the Kakao headquarters.

Zigzag enables personalized shopping experiences with an AI algorithm. It has hit 35 million cumulative downloads with 3.7 million monthly users in Korea. It also achieved 1 trillion won ($772 million) in gross merchandise value (GMV) last year.

Shares of Kakao closed down 2.41 percent at 68,800 won on Wednesday.

By Oh Dae-suk and Susan Lee

[ⓒ Pulse by Maeil Business Newspaper & mk.co.kr, All rights reserved]