J. Walter Thompson Korea Named Agency of Record for PAYCO

NHN Entertainment has appointed J. Walter Thompson Korea as Agency of Record for the company’s new mobile payment services brand, PAYCO.

NHN Entertainment, one of South Korea’s largest online and mobile gaming publisher, is expanding quickly into the e-commerce and payments sector. The company, which is listed on KOSPI, took stakes in seven e- commerce and payment solution providers in Korea and abroad last year, including Korea Cyber Payment, an electronic payment service provider, Bee3Stars Co., a U.S.-based e-commerce venture, and Savaway Co., a Japanese shopping mall solution company.

NHN Entertainment will launch PAYCO, a mobile payments brand that allows users to make online payments with their smart phones simply by typing in a pin code, in the second half of 2015.

PAYCO, which also offers other payment options for offline transactions, including pin codes, credit card recognition, and NFC (near field communication) technology that enables wireless data transfer, such as tap-and-go payments, will be launching its services in phases over the coming month.

J. Walter Thompson Korea, which won the pitch against three large, domestic agencies, will handle both creative and media duties for the account. The agency will create a national campaign for the PAYCO mobile payments brand, spanning print, TVC and digital, that will launch this summer.

“We are very thrilled to have this company as our client. PAYCO is an exciting brand with real vision, and the financial-tech service business has so much potential. It’s a great space to be in right now,” said Junghwan Kim, managing director of J. Walter Thompson Korea.