Naver has secured its first supply contract worth approximately KRW 2 trillion in the AI factory business it is pursuing with Nvidia and Brookfield. Operating profit fell more than 20% in the third quarter due to the burden of infrastructure investment, but Naver expects the AI factory business to contribute to actual profits beginning in 2027.
Naver CEO Choi Soo-yeon said during the third-quarter earnings conference call on the 12th, “We have signed a computing services supply contract worth approximately KRW 2 trillion with a U.S. AI inference company, including next-generation GPUs.” The customer’s name was not disclosed.
The contracted capacity is approximately 20 megawatts (MW), with Nvidia B300 GPUs and the next-generation “Vera Rubin” GPU to be supplied together. The contract runs for approximately five years, with revenue to be recognized progressively as commercial services begin in the first half of next year.
Naver explained that profit margins will be low in the first year because of the time lag between equipment deployment and the launch of services, but it expects a double-digit operating profit margin beginning in 2028 when operations are fully ramped up. The company said, “We are discussing contracts with more than 10 companies” and “will be able to announce contract wins one by one.”
Naver plans to fully ramp up operations to 55MW next year and expand the data center’s operating capacity to approximately 200MW by 2028.
CEO Choi said, “By securing an initial customer through the approximately KRW 2 trillion contract for the AI factory business, revenue from the AI factory business is also expected to be generated progressively,” adding, “At the same time as pursuing long-term contracts with major customers, we plan to expand our customer base as a global AI company to secure both stability and high profitability.”
Naver will also launch a personal AI agent app by year-end. It is designed to support everything from product searches to reservations and payments, while leaving final decisions, such as whether to make a payment, to the user. The number of users of the shopping AI agent rose approximately fivefold and transaction value approximately fourfold in September compared with March, while the search advertising product “Power Link,” which applies an AI prediction model, saw its click-through rate and conversions improve by 12% and 9%, respectively.
Third-quarter consolidated revenue came in at KRW 3.4724 trillion, up 10.7% from a year earlier, but operating profit fell 20.9% to KRW 451.3 billion. This was due to infrastructure costs rising 29.1% and marketing expenses rising 32.3%, following the procurement of computing assets and the start of above-ground construction of the data center.
Revenue by segment was KRW 1.9484 trillion for Naver Platform (up 7.3%), KRW 487.7 billion for Financial Platform (up 14.1%), and KRW 1.0364 trillion for Global Challenger (up 15.9%). Enterprise revenue within the Global Challenger segment, which includes the AI factory business, rose 33.0% to KRW 193.3 billion.
Reporter Lee Jung-hwan ryanlee@aitimes.com
