CIRJE-J-81. Wi, John H. and Junjiro Shintaku, "The Analysis of Formation Process on Korean On Line Game Industry", Augst 2002.

The object of this paper is to analyze formation process of Korean On Line Game (OLG) industry. For the analysis, the paper focused on initial conditions of industry and complementary infrastructures that have enhanced the rapid growth of Korean OLG industry since early 1990s. New type of game called OLG, has the characteristic that a lot of users play a game one another at the same time connecting on the internet with a PC or a console hardware. On this OLG industry, Korea became the most advanced country since late 1990s. Three points were especially analyzed as follows. 1) Initial conditions of industry (underdeveloped console game market, existence of potential users and illegal copy) and complementary infrastructures (PC Bang (room), ADSL and payment system by cellular phones) 2) formation process of leading companies and core engineers in OLG industry 3) main companies which have been searching various OLG game genres. In addition, the paper pointed out three problems appeared in Korean OLG industry now, oligopolistic structure, low profitability and management of product development organization. Finally, the paper shows some implications on the internet contents business.