Busan City Launches Initiative to Foster Game and Content Unicorn Companies... Establishes 'Baby Shark Next Unicorn IP Fund'

Busan City, Busan IT Industry Promotion Agency, and SmartStudy Ventures Triple Agreement

327 Billion KRW Fund to be Established at Inaugural Meeting on the 18th

The signing ceremony of the three-party agreement for the 'Baby Shark Next Unicorn IP Fund' on July 23.

[Asia Economy Yeongnam Reporting Headquarters Reporter Kim Yong-woo] A next-generation fund project to nurture unicorn companies is being launched in Busan.

On the 18th, Busan City announced the establishment of the ‘Baby Shark Next Unicorn IP Fund’ to foster the game and content industry.

The ‘Baby Shark Next Unicorn IP Fund’ was created to discover and invest in content intellectual property (IP) following the global character ‘Baby Shark,’ aiming to revitalize the game and content industry ecosystem and nurture related companies.

On July 23, Busan City signed a tripartite agreement with the Busan IT Industry Promotion Agency and SmartStudy Ventures (the fund manager) to establish the fund, confirming an investment of 1 billion KRW.

At the founding general meeting on the 18th, a first-round fund of 32.7 billion KRW was established, including 18 billion KRW from Korea Venture Investment Corp., the operator of the Korea Fund of Funds, and investments from Busan City, SmartStudy, and other online and offline content companies. The fund size is expected to expand through additional investments by the end of the year.

Through the ‘Baby Shark Fund,’ Busan City plans to focus on nurturing promising small and medium-sized venture companies in the early startup stage of the game and content sectors over the next eight years.

It will also concentrate on investing in early-stage IPs in various content fields such as webtoons, web novels, and animations to discover high-quality content.

SmartStudy Ventures, a subsidiary of SmartStudy?which has secured global recognition with the Baby Shark and Pinkfong characters?and the fund manager, will share the parent company’s success know-how with Busan companies.

Park Hyung-joon, Mayor of Busan, said, “Following last year’s launch of the first fund in the game content sector, the Laguna Dynamic Game Content Fund (15.9 billion KRW), we have continued the fund establishment project and this year formed the second fund, the Baby Shark Next Unicorn IP Fund. We hope this will invigorate the entire game and content production industry in the Busan region and build a virtuous cycle structure where companies grow together.”

This content was produced with the assistance of AI translation services.