When Bang Si Hyuk founded Big Hit Entertainment in 2005, he probably never even dreamed in his wildest dreams that he would later produce one of the best-known boy groups in history. Thanks to BTS, Big Hit is now one of the biggest and most successful entertainment companies in South Korea, and Bang Si Hyuk himself is a billionaire! The label has gone through quite a few changes over the years. Among other things, it is now known under the name HYBE Corporation. HYBE is still mainly known for BTS, but by now it can count several other popular artists as part of its family, such as TXT, Enhypen or, more recently, Le sserafim.
The entertainment companies in South Korea have been shaping the history of K-Pop since the 90s and have had a major influence on the development of the genre. Although Big Hit Entertainment was only founded in 2005, it can keep up with the Big 3 - SM Entertainment, JYP Entertainment & YG Entertainment - and is now often mentioned in the same breath as these three giants, who are known for continuously producing hits. If you are interested in the story of Big Hit Entertainment, you have come to exactly the right place! First, let's get to know the person who started it all:
Bang Si Hyuk - Founder of Big Hit Entertainment
Bang Si Hyuk started working as a composer and songwriter while he was still in college. In the 1990s, when he was 20 years old, he met Park Jinyoung, who was the same age and would later become known as the founder of JYP Entertainment. The two often wrote songs together. When Park Jinyoung founded his own label in 1997, which was still called “Tae-Hong Planning Corp” at the time, Bang Si Hyuk joined the company as a composer, songwriter and producer. In the same year, the two worked together on the debut album of the boy group g.o.d, which was produced by the label EBM (now SidusHQ). Bang Si Hyuk later arranged more songs by g.o.d, such as “One Candle” or “Road”. The boy group became one of the most successful and best-selling K-Pop groups of the early 2000s. Since their success at the latest, Bang Si Hyuk has been known as a “hitmaker”. Over the years he produced many more songs for artists such as Rain, the Wonder Girls, 2AM and, of course, BTS. Specifically for his success with BTS, Bang Si Hyuk received the "Best Producer Award" at the Mnet Asian Music Awards in 2016 and the "Songwriter Award" at the Melon Music Awards. So he still lives up to his title to this day!
In 2005, Bang Si Hyuk left JYP to start his own label: Big Hit Entertainment!
The first artist that Big Hit signed was the vocal trio 8Eight, which consists of two male members and one female member. The trio debuted in August 2007. A year later, Big Hit Entertainment signed a management contract with JYP Entertainment. From then on, the two labels were jointly responsible for managing the four-member ballad group 2AM, which JYP had formed in early 2008 on the show “Hot Blood Men”.
In 2010, 2AM’s Lee Changmin and 8Eight’s Lee Hyun debuted as a project duo named “Homme” under Big Hit Entertainment. In the same year, Bang Si Hyuk laid the foundation for his future success by recruiting Kim Namjoon, who is now known worldwide as BTS’s RM!
But before the boy group took its first steps, Big Hit Entertainment first founded its very first girl group “Glam” in 2012. For this, the label once again worked together with another entertainment company: Source Music was founded in 2009 and managed Glam’s activities. For Source Music, too, it was the first girl group.
The group disbanded in 2015, after only three years. The reason was a scandal involving one of the members: Dahee. In 2014, it came out that Dahee, together with a model named Lee Jiyeon, had blackmailed the actor Lee Byunghun with a compromising video. The two women demanded 5 billion won - about 4 million dollars - and threatened to release the video if the actor did not pay. In January 2015, the court sentenced Dahee to one year in prison. At Lee Byunghun’s request, however, the sentence was changed to two years of probation. On the same day that Dahee was sentenced, the other members of Glam ended their contracts with Big Hit and Source Music, and the girl group officially disbanded.
Fans believe that the chaotic end of Glam is the reason why Big Hit Entertainment did not debut another girl group for the next seven years.
2013 - 2019: BTS & TXT enter the stage
Two years before the end of Glam, in 2013, the new boy group BTS made their debut. Their first songs and albums did not stay in the charts for long, but BTS still won several newcomer awards at the end of the year. With “Skool Luv Affair”, the boy group topped the Korean Gaon Album Charts for the first time in February 2014! From then on, things just kept going uphill. In 2015, BTS won on a music show for the first time with the song “I Need U” from the album “The Most Beautiful Moment in Life”, and in 2016 the boys sold a million copies of an album (Wings) for the first time! In the following years, BTS also achieved success internationally and is now probably the most famous boy group in the world! At the beginning of their career, BTS attracted attention above all with profound lyrics, and even today they do not shy away from taboo topics.
As early as 2017, Big Hit Entertainment announced plans for a new boy group, but it took almost two more years before they were put into action. In March 2019, the time had come: the five-member boy group TXT debuted with the album “The Dream Chapter: Star”. Since TXT was the first new group from Big Hit Entertainment since the debut of BTS six years earlier, fans already had high expectations in advance. These were even exceeded! The debut album topped the Korean Gaon Album Charts and the American Billboard World Album Charts. With the title track “Crown”, the boy group also took first place on the Billboard World Digital Songs Charts. No K-Pop group before them had managed that so quickly after their debut!
At the same time as the debut of TXT, there was a change in the leadership of Big Hit Entertainment. Yoon Lenzo, who had until then been working as the label’s Chief Business Officer, was appointed co-CEO alongside Bang Si Hyuk. He focused on the business aspects of the company, and from then on Bang Si Hyuk concentrated on the creative processes.
2019 - 2021: Acquisitions & partnerships
Just a few months later, in mid-2019, Big Hit Entertainment acquired the video game company “Superb” and another label it had previously worked with: Source Music. Around the same time, Big Hit Entertainment also developed Weverse, a Korean app and platform that provides all kinds of exclusive digital content and enables the label’s artists to communicate with their fans. In addition, there is the Weverse Shop, where Big Hit sells fan merchandise and subscriptions to the exclusive content on the Weverse platform. The content includes, for example, educational and entertainment videos and updates from the label.
Big Hit’s efforts to expand the company had already begun a year earlier. In the second half of 2018, the label founded “Belift Lab” together with CJ E&M, an entertainment and mass media company. Belift Lab is a joint agency that is 48% owned by Big Hit and 52% by CJ E&M. Artists under Belift are therefore produced by both companies together. In 2020, Belift organized a survival show in which 23 talented trainees competed for a spot in a new boy group. The seven winners debuted in December of the same year as Enhypen! Enhypen was able to show success very quickly. For example, the boy group sold more than 310 thousand copies of their debut album “Border: Day One” in just one day. It became the best-selling debut album of the year! Enhypen had therefore well earned the “Next Leader Award”, which was presented to them only two weeks after their debut at “The Fact Music Awards”.
In May 2020, Big Hit acquired another label: Pledis Entertainment. It still operates independently, but its artists - including Seventeen & fromis_9 - have been supported by Big Hit ever since and are increasingly marketed outside of South Korea as well. Just one month later, Big Hit also acquired KOZ Entertainment, which is, among other things, the home of the rapper, producer and songwriter Zico.
In 2021, Big Hit Entertainment was facing a major restructuring. But before it got that far, the label acquired almost 18% of YG Plus, a media and advertising agency of YG Entertainment. In return, YG’s artists joined the Weverse platform. In addition, Big Hit announced a strategic partnership with Universal Music Group (UMG), a Dutch-American multinational music group. As part of this partnership, the two companies want to work together in the fields of music and technology. One of the biggest goals is to jointly debut a global boy group. The group will be put together as part of a casting show that is due to air later this year. Big Hit will select and train the talent, while UMG produces and distributes the music.
2021: Change - Big Hit Entertainment becomes Hybe Corporation
In March 2021, 16 years after the founding of Big Hit Entertainment, the label was renamed “Hybe Corporation”. Among other things, the new name makes clear that Big Hit has evolved and now covers many more business areas than before.
Hybe Corporation operates as a record label, talent agency, music production company, event management and concert production company, and as a music publisher. In addition, Hybe has brought several subsidiaries together under its roof. In April, the corporation founded a new subsidiary: the record label Big Hit Music. This means that Hybe has, so to speak, transferred the label business to the subsidiary. Big Hit Music is therefore responsible for BTS and TXT.
To make the transformation truly complete, the company also moved: into the newly built headquarters in Yongsan. Yongsan is a district in the center of Seoul. In June 2021, the founder Bang Sihyuk also stepped down from his position as CEO in order to focus more on producing music again. However, he remains the chairman of the board of directors.
Even after the restructuring, Hybe acquired more companies and entered into partnerships. For example, Hybe works together with the Japanese streaming platform “Showroom” in order to, among other things, improve its services in Japan.
2022: Le sserafim
In January of this year, Hybe released a series of comics on the platform “Webtoon” that revolve around the boy groups BTS, TXT and Enhypen. The BTS comic was viewed more than 15 million times in the first two days!
Just recently, in May 2022, the six-member girl group Le sserafim made their debut. They are managed by Source Music and therefore belong to Hybe Corporation. This makes Le sserafim the company’s first girl group since Glam disbanded in 2015! The anticipation was high not only for that reason, but also because of the members, some of whom were already very familiar to the public. Kim Chaewon and Miyawaki Sakura were previously members of the project group IZ*ONE. IZ*ONE was formed in 2018 through the popular survival show “Produce 48” and was extremely successful until it disbanded as planned in 2021. Hundreds of thousands of fans mourned IZ*ONE and eagerly waited for the members to debut again, this time in permanent groups. That is why the excitement was huge when Chaewon and Sakura were confirmed as members of Le sserafim. Another member, Huh Yunjin, had also appeared on the survival show Produce 48 and had already caught the attention of a lot of K-Pop fans there.
Le sserafim debuted with the album “Fearless”. Already during the pre-order phase, over 380,000 copies were sold, and on the release day another 175,000! On May 10, eight days after their debut, the girl group won on a music show.
The success was soon overshadowed by a scandal, however. Former classmates of the member Kim Garam made bullying allegations against the singer. Kim Garam stepped back from all activities and has been on a hiatus ever since. Hybe Corporation and Source Music rejected the allegations against Garam and stated that she would not leave the group. We can only wait and see how things continue.
Despite the ongoing scandal, Le sserafim is a successful addition to the Hybe family, which will continue to grow in the future. Today, thanks above all to the success of BTS, Hybe can keep up with the leaders of the entertainment industry. In fact, the sales figures of Hybe Corporation surpass those of the Big 3. Among other reasons, that is why some K-Pop fans even talk about the Big 4 instead of the Big 3: SM Entertainment, JYP Entertainment, YG Entertainment and Hybe Corporation. Others, in turn, believe that Hybe Corporation cannot yet keep up with the long-standing history of the Big 3, which began in the early 1990s. But everyone agrees that Hybe is among the top of the Korean music industry and exerts great influence not only in South Korea, but all over the world.
Divisions & subsidiaries
It is easy to lose track of Hybe’s numerous businesses. That is why we have summarized all of the corporation’s divisions and subsidiaries for you here. The following list shows how broadly Hybe Corporation is positioned. The company has built itself almost a small empire!
Hybe Corporation is divided into three divisions: Hybe Labels, Hybe Solutions and Hybe Platforms.
Hybe Labels supports all record labels that belong to Hybe Corporation. These are Big Hit Music, Belift Lab, KOZ Entertainment, Pledis Entertainment, Source Music and the label ADOR, founded in 2021. The latter has no artists under contract yet, but is preparing for the debut of a girl group in 2022.
Hybe Solutions specializes in video content, learning and games. Currently, two subsidiaries are supported by Hybe Solutions: the game company Superb and HYBE Edu. HYBE Edu creates learning content to support fans who want to learn the Korean language and find out more about the culture.
Hybe Platforms is the technology division, which oversees the subsidiary “Weverse Company”. It takes care of the Weverse Platform, the Weverse Shop and the live streaming platform “V Live”. V Live was founded in 2015 by Naver Corporation and transferred to Weverse Company in March 2022.
In addition to the divisions and subsidiaries, there are also the branches Hybe America and Hybe Japan, which take care of Hybe’s overseas business. This includes, for example, the artists’ activities in Japan and America.
Social media
Hybe Corporation has a YouTube channel on which all of its artists’ music videos and other content are published, as well as a Twitter account with news:
Youtube // Twitter
Currently (July 2022), Hybe Corporation has the following artists under contract:
Big Hit Music: BTS, TXT & solo singer Lee Hyun (formerly a member of 8Eight)
Belift Lab: Enhypen
Source Music: Le sserafim
KOZ Entertainment: Zico & Dvwn
Pledis Entertainment: Seventeen, fromis_9, two former members of NU’EST (Baekho & Minhyun), two former members of Pristin (Yehana & Seungyeon), Bumzu and Nana (formerly a member of After School)
