On October 19 last year, former Kakao CEO Namgung-hun (left) and CEO Hong Eun-taek bow their heads at a public apology press conference at Kakao Azit in Pangyo, Seongnam-si, Gyeonggi-do.
On the 2nd, Kakao disbanded the Emergency Response Committee (Non-Captain), which was formed to respond to the’meal crisis’ last year, and set out to normalize management. As the damage compensation plan was presented on the 29th of last month, there are observations that SK C&C will soon discuss the claim for indemnity in earnest.
According to Kakao officials on the 1st, Kakao plans to issue personnel appointments to the subcommittee and others who have led the non-captain subcommittee on the 2nd and end the non-capital activity. It has been 79 days since the emergency committee was launched on October 16 last year, the day following the SK C&C Pangyo data center fire.
The non-capital committee consisted of three subcommittees, such as cause investigation, recurrence prevention measures, and compensation measures. After revealing the cause of the accident and measures to prevent recurrence at the annual developer meeting last month, the role of the non-capital committee is being finalized by announcing a recent damage compensation plan. It is expected that the payment of compensation plans will be carried out by the follow-up task force (TF).
Former CEO Nam Gung-hoon, who served as the co-chairman of the non-capital recurrence prevention measures subcommittee, will serve as a full-time advisor to Kakao’s future strategic planning organization Future Initiative Center from the 2nd. Go Woo-chan, CCO (Chief Cloud Officer) of Kakao Enterprise, who led the subcommittee on recurrence prevention measures together with former CEO Namgung, will take on the role of head of the newly established infrastructure division, which was recently established directly under CEO Eun-taek Hong.
The industry is observing that Kakao will soon claim the right to indemnity from SK C&C. Kakao previously announced that it plans to review the exercise of the right to indemnity following determining the extent of the damage and preparing a compensation plan.
According to the damage compensation plan announced by Kakao on the 29th of last month, the compensation amount exceeds 550 billion won if three types of emoticons (approximately 310 billion won) and Talk Drawer Plus and Makers coupons to be provided to general users are added. It is estimated that the total compensation amount will increase further if cash compensation for small business owners and 40 billion won in compensation for the first paid service are added.
However, it is predicted that the process of discussing the right to indemnity will be difficult as it is known that the limit of liability insurance for companies in SK C&C’s Pangyo data center is only 7 billion won. An official from Kakao said, “Because the payment of the compensation plan takes precedence, the discussion of the right to indemnity will be reviewed internally following the payment of this compensation plan is completed.”