SK Telecom is unwinding the equity it held in the Australian game company iCandy Interactive. With weak results and no visible synergy, it appears to be focusing on artificial intelligence (AI) and telecommunications.
On the 24th, according to a compilation of reporting by ChosunBiz, SK Telecom disposed of 7,411,624 shares—about 23% of the 32,332,921 iCandy Interactive shares it held last year. Initially, in 2022, SK Telecom spent 2.3 billion won to secure 40,528,399 iCandy Interactive shares. However, as of the end of last year, SK Telecom held 24,921,297 iCandy Interactive shares (equity ratio 1.9%), down about 39% from the time it first acquired the shares.
iCandy Interactive listed on the Australian stock market in 2016. The company specializes in game development and game publishing and is expanding its business into Southeast Asia, South Asia, Latin America, and Europe.
SK Telecom came to hold iCandy Interactive shares in 2022 when iCandy Interactive acquired 51% equity in the Singapore game startup Storms. At the time, iCandy Interactive swapped $8 million of its own shares for 51% of Storms' shares. Storms is a joint venture established in Singapore in 2020 by SK Telecom, Singaporean carrier Singtel, and Thai carrier AIS. SK Telecom held 33.3% of Storms' total equity. After securing 51% equity in Storms, iCandy Interactive had an option clause allowing it to acquire the remaining 49% equity within an agreed period.
In January 2023, iCandy Interactive exercised an acquisition option for 16.3% of Storms equity held by SK Telecom, securing 100% of Storms equity. In the process, iCandy issued about 19.4 million of its own shares to SK Telecom, and as a result, SK Telecom came to hold about 3% equity in iCandy.
SK Telecom viewed Storms as a complement to help iCandy distribute its products across Asia and boost recognition. SK Telecom expected to create Metaverse and Web 3.0 games with iCandy Interactive and open opportunities for Korean games to enter the Southeast Asian market, but the two companies saw no notable synergy. With iCandy Interactive's results also sluggish, it moved to cut its losses.
A SK Telecom official said, "We invested with business synergy in mind, but since there were no results, we are in the process of unwinding the equity," adding, "We plan to focus on the two pillars of telecommunications and AI."