[THE INVESTOR] Korean online English and Chinese education startup Yanadoo selected Korea Investment & Securities as its initial public offering manager, according to industry sources on July 16.

According to sources, Yanadoo selected IPO manager without going through the official procedures of sending out a request for proposal documents and conducting a presentation about the firm. The selection was reportedly based on the personal relationship between a top executive of the startup and Korea Investment & Securities official. Yanadoo aims to be listed on the secondary bourse KOSDAQ, sources said.

Yanadoo main model Jo Jung-suk

Established in 2014, Yanadoo is known for its 10-minute online lectures here. Yanadoo increased its brand awareness through advertising its contents using actor Jo Jung-suk as its main model over the last few years.
The company was acquired by current CEO Kim Min-chul in 2016, who played a major role in raising the sales of EBS Tomokdal, which provides English lectures to boost TOEIC scores, by 10 times to 30 billion won (US$26.6 million) in 2016. Kim recently finished merging his education contents retailing firm Saengsang with Yanadoo.

Since Saesang and Yanadoo’s sales reached 10 billion won and 31 billion won, respectively, in 2017. Industry watchers project that the merged company’s sales will be around 40 billion won this year.

By Song Seung-hyun (ssh@heraldcorp.com)