이 기사는 2021년 06월 02일 07:29 thebell 에 표출된 기사입니다.

South Korea’s cloud market leader Megazone Cloud Corp, which successfully raised funds from many financial investors last year, has grown significantly.

Megazone Cloud recorded revenue of 253 billion won ($228 million) in 2020, up more than 20% year-on-year, according to sources. Its operating loss narrowed to 14.3 billion won from 15.2 billion won in 2019. The number of employees increased nearly 40% to 580 in just one year.

Megazone Cloud provides about 3,000 companies and institutions with services like relocation, establishment, and operation of cloud program. The cloud managed service provider (MSP)’s revenue increased significantly last year as domestic companies gear up for a digital transformation amid the pandemic.

Worldwide end-user spending on public cloud services is forecast to grow around 16% in 2021 to $289.1 billion, up 16% year-over-year, according to a forecast from Gartner.

Founded in 1998, Megazone Cloud has been growing rapidly amid the growth of the global cloud services market. It has gained a dominant position in South Korea’s public cloud market after becoming an Amazon Web Service partner in 2012. Megazone Cloud was split off from its parent Megazone in July 2018.

Megazone Cloud's financial position has improved in recent years. The company used short-term debt to boost its working capital, borrowing 21.2 billion won at an interest rate of 3~4.35% in 2019 and 5 billion won at a lower rate of 2% in 2020. It has no long-term debt. Its debt ratio, which was more than 200% in 2019, dropped by 217.2% points to 35.7% last year.

Megazone Cloud, which plans to go public in 2023, raised funds from financial investors including JKL Partners, Stonebridge Capital, and Korea Investment Partners in a Series B funding round which valued the company at 600 billion won. (Reporting by Ar-rum Rho)