From unfamiliar languages and complicated visa procedures to financial services that hit a wall at the bank's threshold. The inconveniences that foreign workers and international students face in Korea continue from the moment they arrive through every part of daily life.
Clinkers has moved to build a service that consolidates everything on one platform, from hiring and visa guidance to loans, remittances, and support for settling in Korea, to solve these problems. Through its own platform, Glow, it is increasing financial access for foreigners residing in Korea while expanding its business scope to the "dispatch" stage, which recruits and selects workers locally overseas and connects them to jobs in Korea.
Clinkers is a startup that Chief Executive Seo Seong-gwon founded for the second time in 2023. Seo is a developer who has worked on building internet banking and electronic financial systems since the late 2000s and, for more than 15 years in the industry, collaborated with banks and major Fintech companies through a data brokerage platform business. In the early days, the company pursued an overseas financial data business, but it pivoted after feeling the limitation that, given the nature of a B2B business targeting foreign banks and governments, it took a long time to finalize contracts.
The turning point was the government's discussion at the end of 2023 to expand foreigner policies. Seo said, "Although the inflow of foreign workers is increasing, we judged that information asymmetry and a lack of financial access are major problems, so we shifted our business focus to the foreigner market," and added, "We determined it was necessary to solve the structure in which inconveniences repeat throughout the entire process from visas and administration to finance."
Glow aims to be a "life-focused financial platform" for foreigners. It began as a service that provides real-time visa and administrative information, but it has now expanded its functions to focus on loans and remittances. In addition to unsecured loans for foreigners, it also offers a service that compares exchange rates from multiple small remittance companies to present the most favorable terms.
In particular, in the foreigner market, loans are cited as a key revenue source with a fee structure of about 3%. Seo explained, "For citizens, finance revolves around loans and insurance, but for foreigners, limited stay periods make long-term insurance difficult," adding, "Loans and remittances are the most realistic market."
Clinkers' differentiator is a structure that continues through "dispatch-settlement-finance." The company established a local subsidiary in Cambodia and directly secured a worker-dispatch agency, acquiring customers from the stage before they enter Korea from overseas.
Loans originated locally are refinanced with domestic finance and then consolidation continues domestically into remittance services. The data accumulated in this process becomes the foundation for expanding financial services in the future. Seo said, "A platform alone has limitations; you have to secure real offline dispatch infrastructure to break into the market."
Clinkers has acquired two offline loan solicitation corporations to lay its business foundation and has also obtained an online loan brokerage license. It aims to acquire a remittance business license within the year. Overseas, it plans to expand from Cambodia to Vietnam and beyond. In Korea, it is also participating in projects to bring in foreign labor, such as seasonal workers (E-8), in cooperation with local governments.
The revenue structure is also growing rapidly. Monthly loan transaction value is expanding from the tens of millions of won, and the dispatch business is cited as a future core growth axis based on a high per-capita margin structure. The company is targeting 15 billion won in sales this year with an operating margin of 10% and expects to grow to 50 billion won in sales next year.
Seo's long-term goal is to go beyond the platform and become a bank by acquiring a financial institution. Seo emphasized, "Ultimately, you have to own a bank to complete the foreigner financial ecosystem," adding, "In a market rife with illegal brokers and information asymmetry, our goal is to build a transparent and trustworthy system."