KENAZ-IP-HOLDER

NEWS

2025-05-12

"100 million won for new writers"...2025 Webtoon and Animation Awards

[Herald Economy (Suncheon) = Park Dae-sung] Suncheon City (Mayor Noh Kwan-kyu) announced that it will hold the \'Korea Webtoon Competition\' and \'Student Animation Awards (Awards)\' to support the practical creation of webtoons and animations. The awards will be co-organized with Kenaz and Locus, an anchor company in the webtoon and animation industry located in Suncheon. The \"Korea Webtoon Contest Daejeon\" with Kenaz has a total prize fund of 100 million won and is open to aspiring creators aged 19 or older, or internet comic artists who have published less than two media series. Participants can submit purely original webtoons that have not been serialized in any media, with no restrictions on subject matter or material. The four final winners will receive various creative support benefits, including a residency space, mentoring for their webtoon series, and a business rights contract. The Student Animation Awards with Locus is open to high school, college, or university students nationwide, or any individual or team between the ages of 17 and 30 (born between 2008 and 1995). Entry categories are divided into shorts (3 to 10 minutes) and features (20 to 90 seconds), with a total prize pool of 22 million won. The grand prize winner of the short will receive 10 million won, and the grand prize winner of the shorts will receive 5 million won, and the grand prize winner will receive expert feedback on the technical, story, and commerciality of the short from Korea\'s leading animation company, Locus. Submissions for both contests will be accepted from August 26 to August 29, and details can be found on the Suncheon City Hall website. The winning entries will be exhibited and screened at the Global Content Festival in Suncheon (Oltenga) 2025, which will take place from October 17-19 this fall. Meanwhile, Suncheon is promoting a project to create a webtoon and animation cluster with a budget of 39 billion won. parkds@heraldcorp.com

NEWS

2025-03-28

BL drama 'Something's Wrong' to premiere simultaneously worldwide on April 16th

AD The webdrama Something\'s Wrong will premiere simultaneously around the world on April 16th. \"Something\'s Wrong\" (Original Takbon / Written by Seo Ji-eun / Directed by Sung Yoo-hwan / Produced by Moving Pictures Company, Kenaz) is a spin-off drama from the popular BL webtoon \"Something\'s Wrong with Popularity,\" and is a new adaptation of the original story with Dobau (played by Choi Min-ho) and Ji-hoon (played by Jeong Jung-hyun) as the main characters. \"Something\'s Wrong\" tells the story of Dobau\'s (Choi Min Ho) crush on his best boyfriend Jihoon (Jung Jung Hyun) and the exciting youth romance that turns from friendship to love when a new character, Jung Ha Min (Ji Min Seo), enters the picture. The web drama \"Something Went Wrong\" is a 2025 production from Moving Pictures Company, a production company that has produced many popular BL dramas such as \"Pungdeok Villa No. 304\" and \"Happy Ending Outside the Fence,\" and has been anticipated by many BL fans in Korea and abroad since its release. The eight-episode drama, \"Something Went Wrong,\" will be available in Korea on March 16 through OTT platform Heavenly. In Japan, it will be available on Fuji TV\'s OTT service FOD (Fuji TV On Demand), and in the Americas, Europe, the Middle East, Oceania, and India, it will be available on global OTT Rakuten Viki. [Photo courtesy of Moving Pictures Company, Inc. YTN star Kang Na-ri (nrk@ytn.co.kr)

NEWS

2025-03-17

"Aspiring Webtoonists Gather in Suncheon" Webtoon Academy Launched

Global Webtoonist Challenge Opportunity Support for publishing your best work after completion Suncheon-si, Jeollanam-do (Mayor Noh Kwan-kyu) announced on the 17th that it will recruit trainees for the global webtoon discovery project \'Webtoon Startup\' by the 4th of next month. The city was designated as the only Korean cultural city in the field of cultural contents by the Ministry of Culture, Sports and Tourism in December last year, and is preparing for three core projects: business support, human resource training, and citizen enjoyment. Suncheon City is recruiting trainees for the \'Webtoon Startup\' course, a global webtoon discovery project, from April 17 to April 4. Provided by Suncheon City The \'Webtoon Startup\' training course, a human resource development project, will be a sign of Suncheon\'s efforts to establish itself as a center for webtoon creation. \'Webtoon Startup\' will be held for four weeks from April 15 to May 9 at the Suncheon Global Webtoon Center, a collaboration between Suncheon City and Kenaz, an anchor company. It is a webtoon storytelling training program for 15 prospective creators aged 19 or older who are preparing to debut their webtoon works. In this course, participants will be able to complete their plans with excellent lecturers from Cheongang University and on-the-job mentoring from Kenaz, and the best plans will be intensively supported for production in the main course of the Suncheon Webtoon Academy 2025. Webtoon startup trainees can also create and network in the same space with aspiring writers and webtoon PDs from the Angoulême Academy in France, who have been undergoing intensive training in Suncheon since the 13th. A city official said, \"As the largest webtoon producer and specialized education company in Korea has moved to Suncheon, we are preparing to foster the practical talents that companies want and provide high-quality education in the region.\" \"Suncheon will become a place where excellent K-content is produced and content professionals are supplied, inspired by the panoramic space that only Suncheon has,\" he said. By Sunsik Heo, Honam News Center hss79@asiae.co.kr AD | Source: Asia Economic

NEWS

2025-03-14

Korea-France 'Global Webtoon Academy' held in Suncheon-si, Korea

Calling all wannabe writers... until May 16th Suncheon Mayor \"Plan to make it a webtoon sanctuary\" Suncheon-si, Jeollanam-do, which succeeded in attracting global webtoon companies, is opening an academy aimed at professional webtoon education. Suncheon Mayor Noh Kwan-kyu (front row, second from right) and officials from Kenazu-Ono webtoon company take a commemorative photo in front of the Suncheon Global Webtoon Center. Courtesy of Suncheon City Suncheon City announced on May 13 that it has opened the \"Korea-France Global Webtoon Academy\" from May 10 to May 16 for aspiring French artists. Three French (three) and Gabonese (one) aspiring writers and one webtoon PD who excelled at the \'Angoulême Webtoon Academy\' in France last year will be selected for intensive training. Kennaz, a webtoon company that relocated its headquarters to Suncheon, will be in charge of the training, and the French Embassy in Korea, the French Agency for Cultural Affairs Abroad, and the French Ministry of European Affairs will support it. The academy is a follow-up project to the global webtoon talent training agreement signed in June last year between Suncheon City, Kenaz, and French content company Ono Korea. Previously, Suncheon City hosted the headquarters of webtoon company Kennaz and the Korean branch of Ono Korea, a Korean-French joint venture, as the first two companies. \"It\'s great to come to Korea from France, a cultural powerhouse, to learn webtoons,\" said Woojae Lee, CEO of Kenaz. \"Our goal is to build a global webtoon campus based on the growing interest in Korean webtoons not only in France but also in Japan, Taiwan, Turkey, Indonesia, Vietnam, and other countries.\" Suncheon City Mayor Noh Kwan-kyu said, \"With this academy, we plan to attract creators from all over the world who want to learn webtoons to Suncheon and make Suncheon a global webtoon mecca.\" He promised active support. Since the Garden Expo, Suncheon has made the cultural industry its core economic pillar, and has been accelerating its efforts to attract webtoon and animation companies. Various projects (academy, production, business market, etc.) will be implemented to help the companies in Suncheon grow. Suncheon Kim Sun-duk Reporter sdkim@segye.com

EVENT

2024-11-05

Global webtoon company Kenazu-Ono Korea to set up shop in Suncheon

Suncheon City (Mayor Noh Kwan-kyu) announced on the 3rd that it has simultaneously attracted the headquarters of webtoon company KENAZ and the Korean branch of Korean-French joint venture Ono Korea as the first and second companies that will be the first sign of fostering the cultural content industry, a key issue in the 8th civil election. At the 2024 Global Content Festival in Suncheon, held on the 3rd, representatives of the two companies that will relocate their headquarters to Suncheon signed a webtoon agreement at a ceremony to announce the relocation of KENAZ-Ono Korea.(Photo: Suncheon City) The attraction is a follow-up to the \'Suncheon City-Kenazu-France Ono\' business agreement signed in Annecy, France in June, and is the result of a \'trifecta\' of the city\'s steady efforts to attract companies, the needs of companies and writers who highly recognized the potential of Suncheon. At the \'2024 Global Content Festival in Suncheon\' event on March 3, the city announced the relocation of the headquarters with the participation of the Suncheon City Council and officials from both companies, and declared the future vision that Kennaz and Suncheon City will create together. After the animation and webtoon cluster project passed the central investment review of the Ministry of the Interior and Local Government Finance last month, the attraction of the headquarters of the two companies is expected to further accelerate the completion of K-Disney Suncheon, which Suncheon City has presented as its future vision. First, the Korean branch of Ono Korea, a joint venture between Kenaz and Ono, a subsidiary of French media content group MPP, will relocate to Suncheon by the end of the year from its headquarters in Seoul. The initial start-up team will be five people, with plans to expand to 20 people in stages. Kennaz, which has more than 450 webtoon writers and 250 IPs in Korea and abroad, will also relocate its headquarters and webtoon production bases currently located in Jeju Island and Seoul in stages by the first half of 2025. A total of 50 employees will be relocated. Once the relocation of the headquarters is finalized, various cooperative projects in the webtoon field, such as global webtoon production and distribution and a talent training academy, will be promoted in Suncheon together with Suncheon City and Ono Korea. \"One of the most favored careers for our children is the cultural content industry, such as webtoons and animation,\" said Noh Kwan-kyu, mayor of Suncheon City. \"We will actively support Kenaz and Ono Korea, which are moving their headquarters to Suncheon, to grow into solid local and global companies.\" \"Kenazu is the largest webtoon company in the world, and more than 450 writers have chosen Suncheon,\" said Lee Woo-jae, CEO of Kenazu. \"We would like to move our headquarters to Suncheon and contribute to making Suncheon a global webtoon mecca.\" \"Ono is a media group that has been producing manga, webtoons, and anime in France for the past 50 years, and French readers have recently begun to take an interest in Korean webtoons,\" said Ainara Ipas, representative of Ono France. \"With the support of Suncheon City and the Suncheon City Council, we hope to spread Korean webtoons to European readers and have the opportunity to meet Korean readers.\" Starting with this webtoon company, the city plans to actively attract 30 animation and webtoon companies that have expressed their intention to relocate to Suncheon. The city also plans to expand its efforts to attract content companies in various fields such as games, video, and AI. In addition, the city plans to build a virtuous cycle ecosystem by supporting relocated companies to settle and grow in the region, and resettled companies to recruit local talent to make Suncheon a global cultural industry mecca. [Straight News /Jeonnam=Baekhyung Lee] Copyright © Straight News All Rights Reserved Source : Straight News (https://www.straightnews.co.kr)

NEWS

2024-10-11

Suncheon Webtoon Makerthon Creation Camp with Webtoon Company Kennaz

Photo from the Suncheon Webtoon Camp. [Herald Economy (Suncheon) = Park Dae-sung Reporter] Suncheon City (Mayor Noh Kwan-kyu) will hold a webtoon makerathon at Green Island in Ocheon-dong for two days and one night from the 12th. Thirty prospective creators, who were selected through a 2-to-1 competition rate through advance participant recruitment, and six current expert mentors from KENAZ, a webtoon anchor company in the Suncheon Opportunity Development Zone, will participate. The Webtoon Makerthon is the first program of the Suncheon Road Creative Camp, a preliminary project for Korea\'s Cultural City, where participants will spend two days and one night creating webtoon plans based on inspiration from Suncheon. The program will consist of an inspirational tour of Suncheon Bay Wetland and Suncheon Bay National Garden, lectures and mentoring by current writers from KENAZ, and participants will come up with creative ideas at the venue set against the backdrop of Dongcheon and Green Island. The best eight proposals will be selected immediately after the end of the Maker Faire, and the winners will receive a creative support grant of 2 million won per project. The best proposals will have about a month to create a one-episode webtoon, and the submitted works will be evaluated by the public through NAVER Webtoon\'s \'Challenge Comics\' section, and the final three best works will be selected by summing up the evaluation scores of external experts and internal employees of Suncheon City. The finalists will receive a total prize of 10 million won, including 5 million won for first place, 3 million won for second place, and 2 million won for third place. An animation makerathon with another anchor company, Locus, will also be held from the 19th to the 20th. Makerathon, a combination of \'Make\' and \'Marathon\', is an event that provides materials, inspiration, mentorship, and space related to a topic and helps participants come up with creative ideas within a limited time.

NEWS

2024-07-16

Namyangju-Gyeongbok University, Department of Visual Media Contents, 'Kenaz Webtoon Academy' Completion Ceremony

Namyangju-Gyeongbok University-Kenazu \'Webtoon Academy\' graduation ceremony (Provided by Gyeongbok University) On the 11th, Namyangju City and Kyungpook National University held a graduation ceremony for the \'Kennaz Webtoon Academy\' at the Namyangju Campus Creative Center. As a department specializing in the field of realistic media contents (VR/AR/XR), the Department of Visual Media Contents at Kyungpook National University operates various realistic media contents training courses at the Media Art Center, which is equipped with state-of-the-art practice-oriented laboratories to foster practical talents specialized in the fields of video/3D/UX/UI/interaction of realistic media. According to the city, on May 24, it signed a three-way business agreement with Kyungpook National University and Kenaz Corporation (hereinafter referred to as \"Kenaz\") to revitalize Namyangju\'s future leading industries and link local youth employment and startups. ADVERTISEMENT As part of this, from June 17th to the 18th of this month, the \'Kennaz Webtoon Academy\' was opened to provide professional webtoon education to young people in Namyangju and students at Kyungpook National University, and a total of eight webtoon academy classes were held by writers Park Young-joon and Kim Si-ho from Kennaz. Outside of the Webtoon Academy lectures, the students were able to practice their skills on weekdays at Kyungpook National University\'s content production lab to develop their personal skills. Through the course, 10 of the 24 trainees who attended at least six of the eight classes completed the program, including five young people from Namyangju City, including students at Kyungpook National University. \"I thought I could only get webtoon training by traveling to Seoul, but it was great to be able to take the training in Jincheon-eup, which is close to my home, and the instructors were very helpful by paying attention to details and giving me feedback via email,\" said Seo Ji-hyun, a student who completed the academy. A city official said, \"We held webtoon training with Kyungpook National University and Kenaz to strengthen the employment capabilities of young people in new business fields, and we are grateful for everyone\'s hard work.\" \"The Youth Policy Division will continue to do its best to provide education and employment in the fields that young people want,\" he said. The graduates of the \'Webtoon Academy\' will have the opportunity to participate in internships or projects at KENAZ after submitting their individual tasks by the 18th of this month, depending on the final evaluation results of KENAZ. Meanwhile, Kyungpook National University has been authorized by the Ministry of Education to offer a Master of Professional Technology course in the field of \'AI-based XR Simulation Content\' for the 2025 academic year, and is recruiting new students with more than three years of industrial experience. Two new departments will be established: the Department of Design Convergence and the Department of Beauty. Kyungpook National University ranked first in the integrated employment rate among metropolitan universities (more than 2,000 graduates) for six consecutive years from 2017 to 2022, as announced by the Ministry of Education, and was selected as a \'General Financial Support University\' in the 2021 Ministry of Education\'s University Basic Competency Diagnosis Evaluation and the 2022 Ministry of Education\'s Link 3.0 project. In addition, transportation convenience has been greatly expanded by operating free school buses for students and opening a subway station (Gyeongbok University). Reporter Ahn Chung-ki newnew9@joongang.co.kr [Source:JoongAng Ilbo]

NEWS

2024-06-12

Suncheon City-Kenazu-France Ono 'Global Webtoon Talent Cultivation' Agreement

Suncheon-si, Jeollanam-do, signed a business agreement with domestic webtoon company Kenaz and local content company Ono to foster global webtoon talent in Annecy, France, on June 11 and took a commemorative photo. From left, Ono CEO Ainara Ifas, Suncheon Mayor Noh Kwan-kyu, and Kenaz CEO Lee Woo-jae.(Provided by Suncheon City)2024.6.12/News1 Suncheon City, Jeollanam-do, announced on June 12 that it signed a business agreement with domestic webtoon company Kenaz and local content company Ono to foster global webtoon talent in the city of Francian. The agreement was promoted to develop global webtoon content, foster human resources, and develop competitive intellectual property rights (IP). At the agreement ceremony, it was also promised to establish a branch of Ono Korea, a joint venture company between Kenaz and Ono, in Suncheon. Ono Korea is a joint venture established in France last year by Ono, a subsidiary of French media content group MPP, and Kenazu, which has 458 webtoonists and more than 250 IPs. Mayor Noh said, \"Even if local students do not go to the metropolitan area, they can work for world-class companies and showcase their talents on the world stage using Suncheon as a springboard.\" \"We will create all conditions with the government so that they can stay in Suncheon, create, and gain new energy,\" he said.Meanwhile, Suncheon Mayor Noh Kwan-kyu and his entourage are visiting France for five days and seven nights from the 7th to the 13th to attend the \'Annecy International Animation Festival\'. kds@news1.kr

NEWS

2024-05-26

Namyangju-si "to foster young talents to lead webtoon industry"

Signed an industry-government-academia agreement to foster young talent in the webtoon industry Webtoon Academy for 20 young adults... Recruiting participants from June The Korea Times = Kim Dong-hwan | Namyangju City is laying the groundwork to foster young talents to lead the webtoon industry, a promising industry for the future. On the 26th, Namyangju City announced, \"We took the first step in industry-government-academia collaboration in the field of webtoons by holding a three-way business agreement ceremony and inviting webtoon writers to give a lecture together with Kyungpook National University and Kennaz, a Korean webtoon production company.\" The business agreement includes support for the operation of the webtoon academy, which will be launched next month to revitalize Namyangju\'s future leading industries and connect local youth to employment and start-ups, and the roles of each institution. In particular, the city will recruit 20 young people interested in the webtoon field for the \'Namyangju Youth Webtoon Academy\' in June. Participants in the academy will receive systematic and professional training from writers from KENAZ using the infrastructure of Kyungpook National University to become experts in the webtoon field. Those who complete the training will be screened and given the opportunity to hire interns or participate in webtoon production projects. Mayor Joo Kwang-duk said, \"Among the concerns of young people, the biggest concern is the problem of finding a job.\" \"Namyangju City will work with local universities and industries to solve this problem and secure educational and employment opportunities for webtoons and other industries with high potential for future development,\" he said. Meanwhile, Namyangju City also hosted an invited lecture by Moro, the author of \"Wiri Story,\" for about 50 citizens following the agreement. The lecture consisted of the background of \'Wiri Story\', the ecosystem of the webtoon industry, and questions and answers, and received a great response from young people and citizens who dream of becoming webtoon writers. Copyright © The Daily Ilbo All rights reserved. Source : The Korea Daily (http://www.m-i.kr)

NEWS

2024-04-29

Kenaz launches first official MD for popular webtoon 'Secret Love'

[By Kim Ki-joo Kim, News Culture] Kennaz (CEO Lee Woo-jae) is releasing the first official MD for the webtoon \"Secret Love\" following the MD for \"Roses and Champagne\" in February. The work, which is popularly available on the Korean content platform Leedee, will expand its content in various forms, including publishing and drama, starting with this MD. Photo/Kenazu There will be a total of seven MDs with new illustrations of the two main characters not seen in previous works, and they will be available for pre-sale on the OFFICIAL W online store from April 29th at 6pm to May 6th. Kenazu, which has more than 250 IPs based on a solid planning and production system, said that in addition to the release of this MD, it plans to continue its active IP business with various works such as \"Login Murim\". Meanwhile, Kenazu is a webtoon IP holder that is expanding its business in various forms, including webtoon movie adaptations (dramas and movies), opening global pop-up cafes, global publishing, games, and animation production. News Culture Kim Ki-Joo kimkj@knewscorp.co.kr Copyright © NEWSCULTURE All rights reserved. Source : NEWSCULTURE (https://www.newsculture.press)