On the 20th, Naver Webtoon announced that it is actively working to foster local webtoon creators after achieving the number one spot for global webtoons in Southeast Asia. Naver Webtoon provides services in Thai, Indonesian, and traditional Chinese, in addition to Korean and Japanese, across Asia, and is leading the expansion of the global webtoon market by actively investing in establishing local webtoon ecosystems along with exporting Korean content.
On the 19th (local time) in Bangkok, Thailand, Naver Webtoon held the ‘Training Camp,’ a creator education program, for 64 Thai webtoon creators alongside Korean webtoon authors Kim Jeong-hyeon (writer) and Im Ri-na (illustrator) of the popular Korean webtoon “Killer Badroe.” This is the third session since the program resumed after a hiatus due to the pandemic, around five years since it was suspended in June last year.
The Training Camp is a webtoon creator education program that Naver Webtoon has been conducting mainly in Southeast Asia since 2017. It started to address the difficulties overseas webtoon creators face in receiving specialized education related to webtoon creation, which differs from the environment in Korea, and to support continuous, high-quality creative activities.
In the recent Training Camp, activities included sharing know-how from professional Korean authors on webtoon production, Q&A sessions, and feedback on Thai local works.
Natsukairi, a Thai artist who received feedback on their manuscript through the camp, expressed, “I studied direction and composition by self-learning through Korean webtoons, and it was an honor to receive direct feedback on my manuscript from famous Korean authors. I felt that Naver Webtoon pays detailed attention not only to official Thai serialization authors but also to amateur creators.”
Naver Webtoon has been consistently discovering outstanding authors and works across different languages through their amateur author platform ‘Canvas’ and local contests since launching the services in traditional Chinese in July 2014, Thai in November 2014, and Indonesian in April 2015.
As a result of continuous investment in establishing a webtoon ecosystem from the early stages of market entry, local works discovered by Naver Webtoon have seen success, extending to video adaptations.
In Thailand, works such as “Break-Up Service” and “I’m the Most Beautiful Count,” discovered through Canvas, will be released as TV dramas within the year.
In Indonesia, local works such as “Pasutri Gaje,” “Sekotengs,” and “10PM” were produced and released as films or dramas last year.
A drama based on the Taiwanese original webtoon “Black Box” is also set to be released within the year.
A representative from Naver Webtoon stated, “As Korean drama adaptations of webtoons become mainstream, inquiries about local webtoon rights in Southeast Asia are increasing. We will continue to discover high-quality works that reflect local culture and sentiment to solidify our position as the overwhelming number one webtoon platform and expand the global webtoon ecosystem.”