It’s alright to fail.
The process is more important than the result.
Failure is the mother of success.
Trial and error is natural.

Whoever that has heard of proverbs related to failure would receive the above as cliche statements. Some ask the question, thinking it’s not alright to fail, that isn’t the result a lot more important than the process.

However, if this story is told by someone that had failed many, many times, they think again. Taking another step, if someone who experienced big success after those failures told this story, it really seems true.

The Krafton union which has PUBG and Tera’s Bluehole, Phoenix, Squall, Red Sahara, etc left a meaningful message at G-Star 2019.

■ We are Krafton

Cho Min-hyeong, who is in charge of Krafton’s branding, was busy introducing Krafton at G-Star 2019. “Last year’s G-Star was when Krafton was revealed to the world. It’s the brand’s first birthday. Not that many people are aware of this brand, and since it’s a union of studios of several different attributes, we adapted the strategy of ‘in and out’, so that we can meet our customers at multiple locations,” he said.

Krafton was one of the most often seen brands at G-Star 2019. From the entrance, people were able to see the trampoline zone, game demonstration zone, PUBG photo zone, and even in the outside… Outdoor booths feature Krafton, the cafe in BEXCO, also Krafton. In B2C, B2B, Krafton all around. They’re doing a very efficient job of promoting their brand.

They tried to deliver Krafton’s philosophy through these promotions. Cho said, “We wanted to deliver our craftmanship. By craftsmanship, we’re talking about deducting the business side where we simply thrive for more popularity. I think ‘craftmanship’ is earned when our concentration and effort are recognized by the players. I also wanted to talk about the trial and error, and taking challenges. I wanted to share that Krafton’s philosophy is to try a second or third time after failing. Since Krafton is a union, one place could fail, but it’s alright. The others will be there to support the union. It’s not just a simple union of companies. The studios of Krafton gathered with people that empathize on the craftmanship and the direction of trial and error leads us.”

The reason this philosophy draws much empathy is because of PUBG. PUBG Corp is the icon of taking challenges, as they had worldwide success. Marketing head Jeong Hyeon-seop of PUBG Corp said, “PUBG is having unbelievable success, so people might ask, do they need a union? However, we don’t think it’s right to just calculate by numbers. We have a bond of sympathy amongst ourselves. We do what we can do together and grow together, and I think that’s the correct direction. Our slogan is “Separate and again, together”.

■ Separate and again, together

“It’s not a vertical structure. The project leader group that has many different personalities make diverse decisions. The management has faith in their decisions and executes. I don’t think it’s a format where the power is concentrated to a specific person,” explained Cho. Jeong added, “Whoever has the will can lead a project. There are more than enough possibilities for a fluent communication. If they want, they can talk to the CEO alone. This is what actually happens. There are many ways to take a challenge since PUBG CEO Kim Chang-han has also experienced many failures.”

Krafton is already a huge union. There are about 1,800 people in total. PUBG was a company that started with 30 people, but they already have 800 employees. They said that these people share a common value. “It’s hard for nearly 2 thousand people to have the same value, but things like a conference called KDC, Krafton live talks, conversations with the CEO etc helped a lot”, said Cho.

He continued by saying, “We exposed clear messages of our beliefs such as craftmanship and persistence. It’s alright to fail; anyone can fail, and to succeed, there need to be more failures. There’s something you learn from each challenge and each failure is like a vaccine. Many teens and twenties visited G-Star; we really wanted to say this to those people. We reminded ourselves of those words whenever we faced failure during the process of developing PUBG. Not just getting the goods from giveaways, we wanted to have them receive our message in our stories. Although they’re consumers now, I hope they remember this when they become suppliers that can make their own decision.”

Cho concluded the interview with his last comments. “Each studio did things separately, but I think it’s very meaningful that we’re all in this together in Krafton. We each have goals, and there are several studios that thrive to follow PUBG while being together. Our goal is to have more and more people talk here in our next interview. I hope you follow our trial and error with high expectations. Lastly, as we said it’s alright to mistakes to you, it would be a big help when you tell us it’s alright to make mistakes sometimes as well.”