NHN said first-quarter operating profit fell slightly from a year earlier as infrastructure investment expense increased despite steady growth in its main businesses, including games and cloud.
NHN said on the 12th that first-quarter revenue rose 11.9% on-year to 671.4 billion won. Operating profit fell 5% in the same period to 26.3 billion won.
The company said revenue increased as all major businesses—including games, payments, and technology—showed steady growth, but operating profit fell as investment related to AI infrastructure increased.
By business, revenue in the game institutional sector grew 6.8% to 127.8 billion won. The change in the regulatory environment for web board games applied since February led to a broad rise in average revenue per user across all titles. In fact, first-quarter revenue from web board games increased 11% on-year.
In Japan's mobile games, "LINE Disney Tsum Tsum" posted a 47% on-year increase in first-quarter revenue as its 12th anniversary event and collaboration with "Detective Conan" delivered results. In addition, "#Compass" surpassed a cumulative 20 million downloads as of April and ranked No. 1 in iOS revenue through a collaboration with "Chainsaw Man."
Revenue in the payments institutional sector rose 22.1% to 354.6 billion won. Despite seasonal off-peak conditions, NHN KCP's first-quarter transaction volume increased 21%, and Payco continued its growth as transaction value in the corporations welfare solution business climbed 33% on-year.
Revenue in the technology institutional sector, including the cloud business, increased 19% on-year to 125.7 billion won. NHN Cloud's first-quarter revenue grew 20.2% in the same period, and Japan-based technology subsidiary NHN Techorus also saw revenue rise 18.4% on the back of solid performance in its Amazon Web Services (AWS) resale business.
In addition, the other institutional sector was tallied at 84.7 billion won, down 18.9% on-year. NHN Link posted a 32.3% on-year increase in first-quarter revenue, helped by diversification of its business portfolio such as performance production.
NHN said it will deliver new results centered on its main businesses this year and improve profitability.
In the game business, "Dissidia Duelum Final Fantasy," unveiled in March, is maintaining stable traffic and continuing the initial effect of a new release. In its core web board games, the company plans to hold regular offline tournaments that enable direct communication with customers, such as the offline tournament "HPT (Hangame Poker Tour)" for the mobile poker game "Hangame Royal Hold'em."
In the payments business, the plan is to combine NHN KCP's merchant network with NHN Payco's user data and capabilities in running the easy payment business to speed up the preemption of the next-generation payment market centered on stablecoins. NHN KCP is currently preparing its own mainnet optimized for payment processes and, after a proof-of-concept stage, will work to upgrade infrastructure so it can be linked to an actual payment network.
NHN Cloud, which leads the technology business, in late March began full-scale operation of the liquid-cooling-based "GPU B200" built in the Seoul Yangpyeong region as part of the government's "GPU procurement, construction, and operation support project" awarded last year. It then built the ultra-high-spec "GPU B300" at the Gwangju National AI Data Center and was selected as a supplier for the "2026 National AI Data Center Advancement Project," securing growth engines for annual performance improvement. Recently, it also signed a GPU supply contract with AI infrastructure specialist "Vessel AI."
A company official said, "We will respond swiftly to the explosively increasing demand for GPUs and become the leading domestic 'AI cloud service company (CSP).'"
In the defense AX (AI transition) institutional sector, NHN Dooray plans to expand the Dooray service, opened at the Ministry of National Defense in 2024 under the name "Gukbang Ieum," to 300,000 personnel across the entire military in the second half of the year. NHN Cloud will participate in the Defense Acquisition Program Administration's "Joint Command and Control System performance improvement system development project."
Jung Woo-jin, CEO of NHN, said, "Even in the first quarter, key core businesses showed steady growth, allowing us to continue expanding our scale," and added, "Although some of the preemptive infrastructure investment expense for full-fledged AI GPU operations was reflected and acted as a temporary burden on companywide profitability in the first quarter, we expect meaningful performance improvement in the technology business this year as large-scale GPU project orders continue based on our technological edge."