PER, EPS, PBR and BPS are calculated in-house from the last 4 quarters (2025Q3–2026Q2) · Dividend yield is based on ₩85 per share · Prices as of the 2026-10-02 close
WiseNut has shifted its business center of gravity from search and chatbot solutions toward AI agents while holding revenue steady, but quarterly profitability continues to swing.
The AI agent segment's share of revenue expanded to 42.0% in first-half 2026, up sharply from 7.1% a year earlier.
Operating losses widened in first-quarter 2026 before narrowing in the second quarter, when net profit turned positive again, underscoring quarterly volatility.
The company filed a revised value-up plan under which it will pay out 40% of 2026 fiscal-year net profit as cash dividends and use 60% for share buybacks and cancellations.
In the first half of 2026, the company ranked No. 1 by sales share in the AI agent, chatbot and search categories on the government's Digital Service Mall procurement platform.
The pace of results so far falls well short of the 2026 revenue and operating profit targets the company presented at the time of its listing.
Founded in 2000, WiseNut began as an enterprise search engine company built on proprietary natural language processing, machine learning, and text-mining technology.
It expanded into chatbots in 2016 and has more recently pivoted toward domain-specific AI agents that combine large language models (LLMs) with retrieval-augmented generation (RAG) technology.
Key solutions include the RAG-based agent 'WISE iRAG,' the domain-specific LLM 'WISE LLOA,' and the agent development and operation platform 'WISE Agent Labs,' with the product lineup recently expanded to an on-premise 'all-in-one AI search agent' appliance that pairs domestically made NPUs with the company's own LLM and RAG technology.
Its customer base spans roughly 6,500 references across the public, financial, manufacturing, and defense sectors, and since first registering with the government's Digital Service Mall procurement platform in 2017, it has logged 470 contracts worth about 37.2 billion won over nine years.
In the first half of 2026, it ranked first in all three categories on the Digital Service Mall—AI agent (71.5% share), AI chatbot (51.8%), and AI search (35.7%).
The business is split between legacy search and chatbot solutions and the newer AI agent growth engine, with the AI agent segment's revenue share rising from 7.1% to 42.0% year-on-year in the first half, reflecting a fast-moving portfolio shift.
The company has also been expanding into new verticals such as K-beauty (a consortium including LG Household & Health Care), content analytics (a global K-content platform for the Korea Creative Content Agency), and public-sector audit administration (an MOU with UN-Fine). WiseNut listed on KOSDAQ on January 24, 2025 under the technology growth (tech-special) listing track.
| Quarter | Revenue | Operating profit | Op. margin |
|---|---|---|---|
| 2025Q2 | ₩8.1B | ₩900M | 10.7% |
| 2025Q3 | ₩8.8B | ₩1.2B | 13.3% |
| 2025Q4 | ₩12.4B | ₩2.1B | 17.4% |
| 2026Q1 | ₩7.2B | -₩1.4B | −19.8% |
| 2026Q2 | ₩7.4B | -₩200M | −2.2% |
| Year | Revenue | Operating profit | Net income (parent) | Op. margin | ROE | Debt-to-equity |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2022 | ₩34.5B | ₩3B | -₩5.9B | 8.8% | −13.5% | 15.2% |
| 2023 | ₩35.2B | ₩3.5B | ₩4.3B | 9.8% | 8.8% | 13.7% |
| 2024 | ₩34.9B | ₩1.7B | ₩3.1B | 4.9% | 5.9% | 12.9% |
| 2025 | ₩34.7B | ₩100M | ₩1.8B | 0.3% | 2.6% | 9.3% |
Consolidated basis (financial statements including subsidiaries) · Final figures from DART filings · Net income attributable to owners of the parent · Data as of 2026-09-05
Consolidated revenue stayed largely flat over four years: 34.47 billion won in 2022, 35.17 billion won in 2023, 34.92 billion won in 2024, and 34.73 billion won in 2025. Profitability, however, swung more sharply.
Operating profit was 3.05 billion won (8.8% margin) in 2022 and 3.46 billion won (9.8%) in 2023, then fell to 1.70 billion won (4.9%) in 2024 and shrank further to just 114 million won (0.3%) in 2025.
Net profit moved from a 5.90 billion won loss in 2022 to a 4.27 billion won profit in 2023, then declined to 3.05 billion won in 2024 and 1.75 billion won in 2025—staying positive but on a shrinking scale.
On a quarterly basis, revenue of 8.81 billion won with operating profit of 1.17 billion won and net profit of 1.59 billion won in third-quarter 2025 rose to 12.38 billion won in revenue with operating profit of 2.15 billion won and net profit of 2.16 billion won in the fourth quarter, reflecting a clear seasonal peak.
That reversed in first-quarter 2026, when revenue fell to 7.22 billion won and the company posted an operating loss of 1.43 billion won and a net loss of 1.02 billion won.
The second quarter of 2026 saw revenue of 7.43 billion won, a narrower operating loss of 165 million won, and a return to net profit of 503 million won.
Over the trailing four quarters through second-quarter 2026, cumulative net profit came to about 3.24 billion won, with quarter-to-quarter swings partly offset across the window.
On the cash flow side, operating cash flow was positive by more than 5 billion won in each year from 2022 to 2024 but turned negative at -519 million won in 2025, signaling a period warranting attention on cash generation even as headline profitability shows signs of stabilizing. The balance sheet remains conservative, with the debt ratio falling from 15.2% in 2022 to 9.3% in 2025.
The enterprise and industrial AI agent market has been projected to grow at a compound annual rate of 45.1% between 2024 and 2030, providing a favorable backdrop for companies pivoting from search and chatbots toward agent-based offerings.
Public-sector budgets are also expanding, with the Ministry of the Interior and Safety's budget for AI administrative applications rising from 4.2 billion won in 2025 to 18.7 billion won in 2026.
WiseNut has long been a leading player in search and chatbot solutions through the government procurement channel, and it extended that position into first place by sales share across the AI agent, chatbot, and search categories in the first half of 2026.
That said, the achievement came against a backdrop of intensifying competition, with more than 20 AI agent-related solutions now registered on the procurement platform.
In terms of industry cycle positioning, public and corporate customers appear to be in an early phase of moving from pilot and validation projects to actual deployment and operation, a transition in which order timing uncertainty continues to affect when revenue is recognized.
The company's strategy of transferring natural language processing expertise and industry-specific deployment experience from its legacy search and chatbot business into AI agents is viewed as a differentiator versus newer entrants lacking that domain know-how.
The company has stated it will continue expanding domain-specific AI agent business in line with public- and private-sector AI transformation (AX) demand in the second half, while pursuing both revenue growth and profitability improvement.
Concrete projects underway include a roughly 3 billion won K-beauty AI agent convergence project running through 2027 (with LG Household & Health Care participating), a global K-content trend analysis platform being built for the Korea Creative Content Agency, and an MOU with UN-Fine on AI agents for public-sector audit work.
It has also been selected as a supplier for the 2026 AI Voucher Support Program run by the Ministry of Science and ICT and the National IT Industry Promotion Agency and is recruiting demand-side companies, while a customized AI system reportedly intended to support the work of 400,000 civil servants has been reported to be slated for an October launch.
On shareholder returns, the company disclosed a plan to pay 40% of 2026 fiscal-year net profit as cash dividends and use 60% for share buybacks and cancellations—bringing first-year total shareholder returns to roughly 100% of net profit—and to annualize a policy of 40% cash dividends plus at least 40% buybacks and cancellations starting in fiscal 2027.
It has already completed a 10 billion won share buyback and full cancellation between June and September 2026, reducing total shares outstanding from about 13.11 million to about 11.81 million.
Even so, current progress remains well behind the 2026 revenue target of 83.5 billion won and operating profit target of 23.8 billion won presented at the time of listing, leaving the pace and scale of any second-half improvement as a key point to watch.
WiseNut's valuation has sat in a range where the market's read on its growth-stock premium keeps shifting since listing.
One brokerage, in a report dated December 2025, assessed the trailing 12-month price-to-earnings ratio at roughly the high-30s, calling that level demanding given double-digit revenue growth at the time.
Since then, results have alternated between losses and profits, and the price level relative to net assets has moved accordingly.
On the dividend side, because the company introduced a new total shareholder return policy from fiscal 2026 linking cash dividends with share buybacks and cancellations, how the payout ratio and return scale are concretely implemented going forward will shape the direction of related metrics.
Ultimately, the stock's valuation is likely to keep adjusting based on the market's view of whether AI agent revenue can offset stagnation in the legacy business and steadily improve the profit structure.
PER, EPS, PBR and BPS are all calculated in-house (the same method as Naver and Toss) · Dividend yield = cash dividend per share from DART filings (supplemented by KRX) ÷ current price · As of 2026-09-05
First-half 2026 AI agent revenue reached 6.15 billion won, up 539.0% from 960 million won a year earlier. As a result, the AI agent segment's share of total revenue expanded from 7.1% to 42.0%.
The growth is attributed to a combination of new order wins and the conversion of existing legacy customers toward generative AI.
The company filed a revised disclosure committing to pay 40% of fiscal 2026 net profit as cash dividends and use 60% for share buybacks and cancellations, which, if implemented as planned, would bring first-year total shareholder returns to roughly 100% of net profit.
It has already bought back 10 billion won worth of shares between June and September 2026 and fully canceled them, reducing total shares outstanding. Starting in fiscal 2027, it plans to annualize a policy combining a 40% cash dividend with at least 40% in buybacks and cancellations.
In the first half of 2026, the company ranked No. 1 by sales share on the government's Digital Service Mall procurement platform across all three categories: AI agent (71.5%), AI chatbot (51.8%), and AI search (35.7%).
Since first registering on the platform in 2017, it has accumulated 470 contracts worth about 37.2 billion won over nine years and holds roughly 6,500 customer references across the public, financial, manufacturing, and defense sectors.
These references are serving as a foundation for repeat orders and expansion into new verticals such as K-beauty and content analytics.
Fourth-quarter 2025 revenue of 12.38 billion won showed a clear seasonal peak, but first-quarter 2026 revenue fell to 7.22 billion won as the operating loss widened to 1.43 billion won.
Second-quarter 2026 revenue was 7.43 billion won with a narrower operating loss of 165 million won, but the company still had not returned to operating profit. Given a business structure where public-sector orders cluster in specific periods, quarter-to-quarter variance appears to be structural.
At the time of its listing, WiseNut presented 2026 targets of 83.5 billion won in revenue and 23.8 billion won in operating profit.
However, cumulative first-half 2026 revenue reached only 14.65 billion won, indicating the pace of progress is well behind the annual target path. 2025 results also fell well short of the assumptions used in the IPO valuation, meaning market confidence in the company's ability to meet its own guidance has not yet been fully restored.
Operating cash flow stayed positive by more than 5 billion won each year from 2022 to 2024 but turned negative at -520 million won in 2025.
With the debt ratio at a low 9.3%, financial leverage risk appears limited, but cash generation itself, separate from headline earnings, has entered a phase that warrants attention.
As the company simultaneously pursues share buybacks and cancellations alongside expanded dividends, cash flow management remains an important task going forward.
A significant portion of the company's revenue is tied to public-sector orders, so the timing of budget allocation and order placement directly affects results.
In a past fiscal year, cumulative revenue came in nearly 30% below the guidance issued at the start of the year, and order delays have been cited as a factor affecting results more recently as well.
While growth in government AI-related budgets is a positive, uncertainty around the actual timing and scale of execution persists.
More than 20 AI agent-related solutions, including generative AI offerings, are now registered on the government's Digital Service Mall procurement platform, reflecting intensified competition.
Large platform companies and systems integrators are also entering the AI agent market, requiring sustained technology and sales investment to maintain market share.
In June 2026, more than one million shares were sold by institutions within four days following the stock's removal from an ETF's underlying index, sending the share price to a 52-week low.
The company responded with share buybacks and cancellations, but supply-demand shocks tied to index composition changes or shifts in the free float could recur going forward.
This marks the end of the 10 billion won share buyback program that began on June 18, so it is worth checking whether the buyback was completed and how the subsequent cancellation process proceeds.
This is when a customized AI system reportedly designed to support the work of 400,000 civil servants is slated to launch, making it a point to verify whether the launch occurs and gauge the initial response.
This is when the third-quarter 2026 report is expected to be disclosed, making it important to check whether the AI agent revenue share continues to expand and whether operating profit stabilizes in positive territory.
It will be important to verify how the policy combining a 40% cash dividend with at least 40% in buybacks and cancellations, set to apply from fiscal 2027, is concretely approved through the board and shareholders' meeting.
WiseNut is in a transition period, shifting its center of gravity from a stable but stagnant legacy search-and-chatbot business toward a fast-growing AI agent business.
AI agent revenue rose sharply in first-half 2026 compared with a year earlier, but quarterly operating results have continued to alternate between profit and loss, not yet settling onto a fully stable trajectory.
The balance sheet remains conservative with a low debt ratio, though the shift to negative operating cash flow in 2025 is worth watching.
The company has been working to rebuild shareholder trust by concretizing a policy that returns a large share of net profit through cash dividends and share buybacks and cancellations, and it continues to demonstrate share leadership in the public procurement channel along with expansion into new industry verticals.
That said, progress so far falls well behind the 2026 revenue and profit targets set out at the time of listing, leaving the pace at which any gap narrows in the second half and beyond as a key point to watch.
Ultimately, how this stock is assessed will hinge on whether AI agent revenue growth can offset stagnation in the legacy business and translate into a stable profit structure.
Report written 2026-09-05 · Data as of 2026-09-04
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