The recent South Korean social media giant Cyworld is deadset to get a second chance at relaunching its business following new ownership – to preserve its former glory with a new token.
According to Hanguk Kyungjae, the company is now under new ownership, after a union of at least five domestic firms – all unnamed besides the entertainment firm SKY E&M – saved Cyworld from its troubled previous owner for a petty USD 897,000.
The media outlet pointed out that, as an outstanding wage bill to Cyworld workforce totaled around the same amount, the federation had, in effect, picked up a company with a worth of zero.
Nevertheless, the Cyworld brand name is still tough in South Korea. The social media network has begun in 1999 and experienced huge popularity in the early 2000s. With some 25% of the nation believed to be active Cyworld users at its peak toward the end of the decade. It was bought out by business conglomerate SK in 2003, and its popularity spread to China and other Asian nations.
A data leak and the rise of non-domestic social media platforms led to a sharp decline after 2011, though, and the firm was finally sold off to Aire in 2016.
Under the new ownership, Cyworld then attempted to launch a crypto business, establishing almost USD 0.5m in token sales for a token named Cling – before seeing prices bottom out.
A painful struggle over unpaid wages to scores of employees then broke out before the company was eventually sold off to the consortium, which has now unveiled plans to rebrand it as Cyworld Z.
The federation has conceived a new Ethereum-based token called Dotori (Acorn), which, media outlets report, they hope to list on “one of the country’s top three crypto exchanges.”
Hanguk Kyungjae, though, quotes an unnamed crypto exchange employee as stating that their platform had “never held any discussions with Cyworld.”
Nevertheless, the consortium has according to reports received over USD 7 million worth of backing from investors and plans a “Cyworld 3.0” PC version launch next month, as well as a mobile rollout in the first half of 2021.
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