NCSoft said Friday it has launched an entertainment subsidiary Klap to expand its business portfolio.

According to the South Korean game company, it established Klap on July 13 and invested 800 million won ($675,000) to control 66.7 percent of the subsidiary.

Klap has 14 business objectives including video, webcomics, an online music service and internet broadcasting.

Kim Taek-hun, senior vice president and chief publishing officer at NCSoft, has been appointed as the CEO of Klap. Also, NCSoft’s entertainment business chief Kim Jung-ha and a marketing executive from Starship Entertainment will join Klap as executive directors.

Kim Taek-hun was promoted to senior vice president in January after the huge success of NCSoft’s flagship mobile games Lineage M and Lineage 2M.

Klap‘s studio will located in Gangnam-gu, Seoul, not at NCSoft‘s headquarters in Pangyo, Gyeonggi Province.

NCSoft’s decision to enter the entertainment business is drawing a parallel with its competitor Netmarble, which spent 200 billion won to purchase a 25 percent stake in Big Hit Entertainment in 2018.

Though details about the content that Klap will introduce has not been revealed, it will decide on specifics of the business and unveil plans in the second half of this year.

By Kim Byung-wook (kbw@heraldcorp.com)