Kim is the founder of KaKao, the largest mobile messaging company in South Korea. The Jeju City-based group has over 52 million users of its Kakao Talk app and revenue of 6.1 trillion won ($5.4 billion) in 2021. Also known as Brian Kim, he developed the app after stepping down from South Korea's biggest internet portal in 2007.
Brian Kim's net worth of $5.27B can buy ...
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The majority of Kim's fortune is derived from his 24% stake in Kakao, an internet and mobile messaging company in South Korea. The company is the biggest mobile messaging company in South Korea and its Kakao Talk app has over 53 million monthly active users globally, according to a November 2022 corporate presentation.
Kim owns the shares directly and through his wholly-owned holding company, K Cube Holdings, according to its 2022 third-quarter report. Shares that have been pledged as collateral are excluded from the net worth calculation.
The value of his cash investments is based on an analysis of dividends, insider transactions, taxes, market performance and charitable giving.
Hugh Kim, a spokesman for Kakao, declined to comment on Kim's net worth.
Kim was born in 1966. He was the first sibling to attend college, studying industrial engineering at Seoul National University, where he offered private tutoring to help pay his tuition fees.
Playing games like poker and pool led him to create his first business, online game portal Hangame Communications, in 1998. Hangame merged with Naver.com, in 2000. Kim led the combined company, NHN Corp., before stepping down in 2007. Kim, who was living in the U.S. with his family, came back to his home country to develop apps at Iwilab, a venture company he founded in 2006, following the introduction of the iPhone.
The breakthrough for Iwilab came in 2010, when Kakao Talk was created. Four years later, the company merged with South Korea’s second-largest internet portal operator, Daum Communications Corp. He became the largest shareholder of the combined entity.