Long-discussed merger talks between Korea’s two largest domestic streaming platforms, Tving and Wave, have stretched into yet another year without resolution, according to Korean media coverage of the negotiations — a delay industry observers say reflects the genuine difficulty of combining two platforms with different corporate parents, shareholder structures, and content strategies into a single “mega OTT” capable of competing more effectively against Netflix and Disney+.
KT, Wave’s controlling shareholder, has cited considerations including “shareholder value enhancement” as part of its deliberation process, while a recent leadership vacancy at KT has added further uncertainty to the negotiation timeline, according to Korean business press tracking the talks — illustrating how corporate governance issues at the parent-company level, separate from any strategic disagreement about the merger’s underlying logic, have contributed to the repeated delays.
The push for consolidation stems from a shared structural problem facing Korea’s domestic streaming platforms: production costs for competitive original content have risen sharply, but Korea’s market alone doesn’t generate sufficient subscriber revenue to recoup increasingly expensive content investments — a dynamic that has led industry voices to warn that domestic platforms risk mutual collapse without consolidation or some other structural response to the widening cost gap with global competitors.
While Tving and Wave negotiate merger terms, each platform has continued pursuing distinct near-term strategies independently: Tving has signaled plans to expand its advertising-supported revenue model around live sports and short-form content partnerships, while Wave has emphasized building out its content identity around verified entertainment IP rather than waiting for merger resolution to define its strategic direction.
Industry analysts continue viewing consolidation as the most plausible long-term path for Korea’s domestic streaming platforms to remain competitive, but with merger talks now extending across multiple years without a finalized agreement, some observers have begun questioning whether the window for an effective combined response to global platform competition may be narrowing.
Source: Korean OTT industry coverage of Tving-Wave merger negotiations, 2026.
