The problem
For a small K-beauty label, getting influencer seeding kits made means weeks of KakaoTalk haggling with factories of unknown reliability: quotes that shift, samples that differ from bulk runs, and launch dates that slide with nobody accountable. Big brands have sourcing teams; everyone else has hope.
How it works
ZOOC, founded by Konkuk University industrial-engineering student Kim Hyo-jae, offers SeedOps: an automated SaaS platform where businesses design brand marketing kits, get them produced through vetted partners, and have them delivered. The startup exhibited at CES 2024’s Seoul Pavilion and was selected for the Asan Nanum Foundation’s Maru SF program — office space and networking in Silicon Valley — to aim the service at influencer seeding kits for K-beauty and consumer-goods brands entering the US.
Pain points
Opaque factory pricing, flaky quality, and production timelines owned by no one — the exact frictions that keep small brands from running the influencer campaigns their bigger rivals take for granted.
Business model
No public pricing yet — at incubator stage the team is building the platform, not monetising it. The natural path is a take rate or margin on every kit run, expanding from seeding campaigns into repeat brand-merch production.
Challenges
Still a pre-commercial student project: no disclosed funding or factory network at scale, cross-border quality control to prove, and competition from entrenched sourcing agents plus global print-on-demand platforms. As the founder puts it, the goal is not to be another production agent but to redefine the standard of the production industry as a platform — a standard incumbents will not surrender cheaply.
Funding
- Raised: nothing disclosed — paper stage, funding MISSING.
- Valuation: MISSING.
Latest — October 2025
ZOOC’s next push is the United States via the Maru SF program, targeting influencer seeding-kit demand among K-beauty and consumer-goods brands — covered as part of Korea JoongAng Daily’s October 2025 report on Konkuk University’s student startups going global.