이 기사는 2021년 07월 26일 08시04분 thebell에 표출된 기사입니다

South Korea’s Tmon has decided to postpone its initial public offering as the ecommerce company revisits its business model after a new chief executive officer took over last month.

Tmon has recently told Mirae Asset Securities, which was hired as an underwriter last year, that its target to go public this year is unlikely to be met, industry sources said on Thursday.

The move came after a new leader took the reins. In June, Jang Yoon-seok was appointed as chief executive, replacing Lee Jin-won who served in the role for about two years.

The leadership change came as the company struggles to survive in the competitive ecommerce market. Unlike its rival Coupang, which has aggressively increased spending to expand market share, Tmon has focused on profitability in the past few years. It entered into discussions to sell itself to Lotte Group in 2019. After the deal fell through last year, the company started a process to go public on the local bourse in 2021, but now the IPO plan has also been delayed.

This contrasts with Coupang, which successfully made a stock market debut in New York earlier this year. Over the last decade since the two companies founded in 2010, Coupang has grown rapidly with revenue close to 14 trillion won ($12 billion) in 2020.

In contrast, Tmon has seen stalled growth with 2020 revenue of only 151.2 billion won. Despite its focus on profitability, the company is still in the red.

Jang, 43, is a platform specialist who previously held senior roles at several online content providers. Prior to joining Tmon, he led Atreez, which operates mobile content platform Pikicast.

Shortly after taking the helm at Tmon, Jang started to overhaul the company’s strategy and business model. He also created a strategic planning team only consisting of millennial and Generation Z employees. The team directly report to Jang.

“We decided to delay our IPO plan and it’s incorrect to say that the plan was canceled,” said an official at Tmon. “The newly created strategic planning team will lead new businesses.” (Reporting by Seon-ho Kim)