NHN is adjusting the direction of its games business to target the Japanese market and has set out specific plans to secure new growth engines in its cloud, payments and defense units.

NHN CEO Jung Woo-jin (정우진) said on a conference call on May 12 for the company’s 2026 first-quarter results that it is currently preparing a strategic shift in its games business targeting Japan. He said the company is pursuing contracts with intellectual property with high recognition in Japan or working on projects that currently have only code names.

The move aligns with an improvement trend in the performance of its Japan mobile games revealed on the call. "LINE: Disney Tsum Tsum" posted first-quarter revenue up 47 percent from a year earlier and up 94 percent from the previous quarter, helped by a 12th anniversary event in January and a "Detective Conan" collaboration in March. "#Compass" continued its rebound, including taking the top spot in iOS revenue rankings in April through a "Chainsaw Man" collaboration. NHN is adjusting the direction of its games business through IP with high recognition in Japan and new projects as performance in Japan mobile games has been confirmed.

Yangpyeong region to begin recognising revenue in Q2; cloud and defense AX as new drivers

NHN Cloud, a core part of its technology business, began operating water-cooled B200 GPUs at the Seoul Yangpyeong region at the end of March as part of a government "GPU procurement, buildout and operations support project" it won last year. CFO Ahn Hyun-sik (안현식) said that as the Yangpyeong region began normal operations at the end of March, related revenue is expected to be recognised starting in the second quarter. He said about 7.3 billion won in amortisation of GPU-related right-of-use assets and depreciation of tangible assets was reflected in the first quarter.

The five-year revenue target for the Yangpyeong region remains about 300 billion won. Ahn added that while there appears to be room for an upward revision due to a surge in GPU demand, it is difficult to reflect that in guidance for now. He projected NHN Cloud’s overall CSP revenue to grow by more than 30 percent this year. It has built ultra-high-spec B300 GPUs at the Gwangju National AI Data Center, and recently signed a GPU supply contract with VesselAI, with revenue of more than 20 billion won expected.

NHN Cloud will strengthen competitiveness in public and financial markets with high security requirements through the merger of Innogrid and its subsidiary NHN Injea I&C. The defense AX market is a separate strategic target, and it plans to step up efforts based on capabilities to build and operate private cloud and GPU infrastructure. It will expand the collaboration platform "Gukbang-Ieum" to about 300,000 service members across the entire military in the second half of this year and is also participating in the Defense Acquisition Program Administration’s "Combined Command and Control System Performance Improvement System Development Project" led by Hanwha Systems.

Payment-specialised mainnet, Mercedes-Benz Korea onboard; payments business expansion

In its payments business, plans to pre-empt the next-generation payments market are taking shape. NHN KCP is building a payment-specialised mainnet model with Ava Labs, the developer of Avalanche, and plans to link it to actual payment networks after a proof-of-concept stage. NHN Payco will serve as a touchpoint connecting users and merchants in the process.

Merchant expansion is also continuing. NHN KCP was selected in April as the payment infrastructure provider for Mercedes-Benz Korea’s new vehicle sales structure, following Tesla, expanding its base of large merchants.

NHN will also begin buying back 16.7 billion won worth of its own shares from May 12. The amount is equal to the full funding planned for the year, and it will cancel all acquired shares immediately after completion. Jung said the share buyback using the full annual funding reflects confidence in improved performance this year.