Hopae scores big seed investment to match ambitions in EU DID market

Korean digital identity authentication startup Hopae has attracted 6 billion won (US$4.3m) worth of seed investment, according to a report from the Maeil Business Newspaper.

The round is led by SV Investment, with participation from Japan’s Z Venture Capital and Bon Angels Venture Partners.

Founded in 2022 on the back of the COOV vaccination certificate program, which managed 43 million users during the height of the COVID-19 pandemic, Hopae boasts a digital identification and authentication system based on its own patented technology, Digital Credit Express (DCX). Its goal is to provide decentralized identity (DID) on a national scale, with a particular focus on the opportunities arising in the EU market as a result of the eIDAS 2.0 regulation and the EUDI Wallet program, which requires all member nations to offer citizens a digital wallet by 2026.

“The size of the digital identity market is estimated at 600 trillion won in Europe alone, so it has great potential,” says Shim Jae-hoon, CEO of Hopae. Shim says the firm plans to “actively recruit world-class developers and talents who can establish global businesses and strategies,” to build on the more than 1.3 million global downloads of its open-source code.

Hopae’s work on digital wallet frameworks and verifiable credentials built on DID has potential use cases in airports, shipping and e-sports. The company was invited to the OpenWallet Foundation (OWF) as a founding general member, and recently participated in the pitch competition at Identity Week. It operates offices in Seoul, San Francisco and Paris. Its ambitions are big; Shim has said he wants to see Hopae become as big as Visa. It is early days in the DID sector, and Hopae wants in on Europe while eIDAS 2.0 is still fresh.

Article Topics

decentralized ID  |  digital identity  |  funding  |  Hopae  |  Korea  |  verifiable credentials