[E-Daily Reporter YU JIN-HEE ] Wise birds Inc.(273060)is drawing attention as it begins in earnest to support domestic pharmaceutical and biotech companies in entering the U.S. direct-to-consumer (DTC) market. The company’s strategy is to achieve a second leap forward through synergies with pharmaceutical, biotech, and medical device companies capable of marketing to North American consumers.

Differentiation Proven in 2013 as Korea’s “First” Facebook

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It is rare for a domestic digital advertising agency to systematically target the overseas advertising market for the pharmaceutical and biotech sectors. However, this is a first-mover strategy—securing a foothold before a new market opens up. This has been the consistent formula driving Wise Birds Inc.’s growth over the past 13 years.

Wise birds Inc. is a real-time bidding (RTB) advertising company founded in May 2013 by CEO Kim Jong-won. In its first year, it became the first company in Korea to earn the Facebook Marketing Partner (then PMD) badge through its self-developed advertising platform, “Adwitt.” For the next three years, Wise birds Inc. was the only company in Korea to hold this badge.

At the time, TV and portal sites dominated the domestic advertising market, while Facebook was an unproven, emerging channel. While major agencies adopted a wait-and-see approach, Wise Birds Inc. secured technology partner status first, thereby establishing a strong barrier to entry. As Facebook ad volume surged, the benefits were concentrated on Wise Birds Inc., which held partner status. Building on this foundation, the company was successively selected as an Instagram AdTech Partner in 2015 and a Google Premier Partner in 2017. Its advertising volume (the total advertising spend by advertisers) also recorded explosive growth, rising from 1 billion won in its first year to 579.2 billion won in 2025.

Wise birds Inc., which entered the KOSDAQ market through a SPAC merger in 2020, expanded its scale in 2024 by acquiring 100% of the data-driven marketing company “AdEfficiency” for 74 billion won. The combination of Wise birds Inc., which excels in mobile app advertising, and AdEfficiency, which possesses strengths in search advertising and e-commerce, has created an integrated advertising execution system that encompasses both display advertising (DA) and search advertising (SA).

This system is led by two co-CEOs with distinct backgrounds. Founder Kim, who worked at early-stage domestic internet companies and served as a division head at InnoBuzz Media before founding WiseBuzz Inc., has been overseeing the company’s overall management for the past 13 years.

CEO Choi Ho-jun, who joined as Chief Operating Officer (COO) in 2021 and was appointed co-CEO in March 2025, is a global platform expert who previously served as an executive at Yahoo, Naver, and Facebook Korea; he oversees the sales division. This management structure, which includes executives with experience on both sides—advertising agencies that sell ads and media companies that sell ad space—aligns with the company’s growth strategy centered on media partnerships.

Full Lineup of “Top-Tier Partnerships” with 11 Media Outlets… Fortress-Like Barriers to Entry

Wise birds Inc. was also selected as a “TikTok Marketing Partner” (TMP) in 2025—the first company in Korea to achieve this distinction. This marks a replication on TikTok, 12 years later, of the success formula the company established on Facebook in 2013. TikTok’s monthly active users in Korea have grown explosively over the past two years, reaching 20 million, and Wise birds Inc. secured partner status right at the outset of this growth phase.

The third strategic move was made in the field of generative artificial intelligence (AI). Last June, Wise Birds Inc. ran an OpenAI “ChatGPT” ad campaign targeting North American users in collaboration with CLIO Cosmetics Co., Ltd. This was the first instance among Korean agencies of applying generative AI-based interactive advertising to real-world marketing. Given that OpenAI has decided to expand ChatGPT advertising to five countries, including South Korea, WiseBirds is credited with proactively gaining practical experience in the North American market ahead of the official launch.



The results of 13 years of first-mover advantage are evident in its unparalleled partnership portfolio. Together with its subsidiary, AdEfficiency, Wise birds Inc. has secured top-tier partner status with a total of 11 key media platforms, ranging from △Meta, △Google, △TikTok, △Naver, and △Kakao to △Coupang, △Toss, △Danggeun, △Moloco, △Netflix, and △Linked Inc. With a lineup that comprehensively spans global Big Tech companies, portals, e-commerce platforms, fintech firms, and OTT services, it boasts the largest scale among domestic advertising agencies.

This status cannot be obtained through financial resources alone, acting as a barrier to entry that makes it difficult for latecomers to catch up in the short term. This is because global platforms like Meta and Google grant top-tier status to only a select few agencies after comprehensively evaluating their advertising management capabilities, campaign performance, and cumulative revenue. From an advertiser’s perspective, this allows for the integrated, one-stop management of diversified media channels through a single provider, enabling simultaneous cost savings and maximized efficiency. The system supports two-way campaign execution, ranging from inbound campaigns in Korea for international advertisers to global outbound campaigns for domestic advertisers.

Wise birds Inc.—which chose to enter Facebook in 2013 when it was still unfamiliar, TikTok in 2025 before its growth took off in earnest, and began hands-on execution in North America in 2026 prior to the domestic launch of ChatGPT ads—is now turning its attention to the U.S. advertising market for the pharmaceutical and biotech sectors, a territory previously unexplored by the domestic advertising industry. Although the media and industry sectors have changed, the winning formula—“enter before the market opens and build barriers”—remains the same.

Choi Ho-jun, co-CEO of Wise birds Inc., emphasized, “The manufacturing technology and pharmaceutical competitiveness of Korean biotech companies have reached world-class levels, and exports to the U.S. are increasing significantly every year,” adding, “Based on our status as a top-tier partner on more than 11 global media platforms, we will be at the forefront of the emergence of K-Bio blockbusters.”