On October 19 last year, former Kakao CEO Namgung-hun (left) and Chief Executive Officer Hong Eun-taek bowed during a public apology press conference at Kakao Azit in Pangyo, Seongnam-si, Gyeonggi -do.
On the 2nd, Kakao dissolved the Emergency Response Committee (non-captain), which was formed to respond to last year’s “meal crisis”, and set out to normalize management. As the damage compensation plan was filed on the 29th of last month, there are remarks that SK C&C will discuss the compensation claim in earnest soon.
According to Kakao officials on the 1st, Kakao plans to issue personnel appointments for the subcommittee and others who led the non-captain subcommittee on the 2nd, and put an end to non-capital activity. It has been 79 days since the emergency committee was launched on October 16 last year, the day after the SK C&C Pangyo data center fire.
The non-property committee consisted of three sub-committees, such as cause investigation, reoffending prevention measures, and compensation measures. After revealing the cause of the crash and measures to prevent a recurrence at its annual developer meeting last month, the extra-capital committee’s role is being finalized with the announcement of a recent damages plan. Payment of the compensation plans is expected to be made by the Follow-up Task Force (TF).
Former CEO Nam Gung-hoon, who served as co-chair of the subcommittee on non-capital recurrence prevention measures, will serve as a full-time advisor to the Kakao Future Initiative Center’s future strategic planning organization since the 2nd. Go Woo-chan, Chief Cloud Officer (CCO) of Kakao Enterprise, who led the subcommittee on recurrence prevention measures together with former CEO Namgung, will assume the role of head of the new infrastructure division, which was recently established directly under CEO Eun Taek Hong.
The industry is noting that Kakao will soon claim compensation from SK C&C. Kakao had previously announced that he would review the exercise of the right to compensation after determining the extent of the damage and preparing a compensation plan.
According to the compensation plan announced by Kakao on the 29th of last month, the compensation amount exceeds 550 billion won when adding three types of emoticons (about 310 billion won) and Talk Drawer Plus and Makers coupons to be provided to general users. It is estimated that the total amount of compensation will further increase if the cash compensation for small business owners and 40 billion won in compensation for the first paid service are added.
However, the process of discussing the right to compensation is expected to be difficult as it is known that the liability insurance limit for companies in SK C&C’s Pangyo data center is only 7 billion won. A Kakao official said, “Because the payment of the compensation plan takes precedence, the discussion of entitlement to indemnity will be reviewed internally after the payment of this compensation plan is completed.”
