In the 1990s, Son Joo-eun was a much sought-after tutor offering only a select few affluent students tips on how to score well in the national college exam. Having grown up poor and landed a place at the elite Seoul National University, he easily took home 50 million won ($47,000) from his tutoring work, enough to buy a standard two-bed room house in Seoul back then, each month.



The life of the star hagwon teacher soon got on a fast track to fame and fortune.





Son Joo-eun, head of MegaStudy (Photographed by Park Hyun-koo/The Korea Herald)



In 2000, he founded an online cram school, MegaStudy, offering test-prep courses to a much wider audience. The venture, which started off with five staff and an initial paid-in capital of 300 million won, became an instant sensation among students and parents, bringing him success that he had never imagined.



“I’d earned money by taking advantage of the country’s obsession with college diplomas,” Son, now 56, said in his super-spacious office at MegaStudy’s headquarters in Seoul.



Deep inside, there has always been a sense of guilt, Son said, that he is capitalizing on cruelty that pushes young students into long hours of afterschool study and fierce competition to enter top universities.



Businesswise, MegaStudy’s early success is case study material.



In 2004, MegaStudy debuted on the Kosdaq, a tech-focused secondary bourse. In the years that followed, the firm’s market capitalization peaked at a whopping 2.5 trillion won. Investors loved Son’s venture as a textbook case that turned the country’s obsession with education and a high internet penetration rate into a perfect business opportunity.





(Photographed by Park Hyun-koo/The Korea Herald)