OpenAI CEO Sam Altman, right, and Kakao CEO Chung Shin-a during Kakao's media day event at The Plaza Seoul hotel, Feb. 4 / Korea Times photo by Shim Hyun-chul

Kakao, the operator of the country's dominant mobile messenger KakaoTalk, said Thursday its fourth-quarter net loss narrowed due to lower impairment assessments on content units.

Its net deficit totaled 276.9 billion won ($190.1 million) for the quarter on a consolidated basis, compared with a net loss of 1.91 trillion won a year ago, the company said in a regulatory filing.

Its operating profit sank 33.7 percent on-year to 106.7 billion won, and revenue fell 2 percent to 1.95 trillion won.

The company said the decline in quarterly net loss was led by a decrease in asset impairment losses from its content units acquired in previous years.

Quarterly sales from the platform business unit rose 10 percent on-year to 1 trillion won on higher revenue from its mobile messenger, KakaoTalk.

However, sales from the content business unit dropped 13 percent on-year to 910.1 billion won on the sluggish performance of its gaming, music streaming and webtoon units.

For 2024, its net loss decreased to 43.6 billion won from a net deficit of 1.81 trillion won.

Its operating profit for the year rose 6.6 percent on-year to 491.5 billion won, and annual sales increased 4.2 percent to 7.87 trillion won.

The company said it plans to introduce its new artificial intelligence (AI) service, Kanana, and other related services later this year in collaboration with U.S. AI giant OpenAI.

"Our joint goal is to popularize AI in the Korean market and make it widely used by domestic users in their daily lives," CEO Chung Shin-a said in an earnings call.

"We expect it to be difficult to sustainably operate the most popular AI service in Korea and make a profit," she said. "We are trying to find the right answer through various attempts."

Earlier this month, Kakao announced a strategic partnership with OpenAI, with plans to apply ChatGPT to its KakaoTalk messenger that boasts more than 50 million users and co-develop more AI products. (Yonhap)