K-pop as an industry
Agencies...
The three biggest agencies in terms
of revenue are S.M. Entertainment, YG Entertainmentand JYP Entertainment, often
referred to as the "Big Three", whose stocks are traded at the Korea Exchange. In K-pop these record labels also function as agencies for the artists. They
started operating as such at the beginning of the 2000s. They are responsible
for recruiting, financing, training, marketing and publishing new artists as
well as managing their activities and public relations.
In terms of market share the biggest
agency is S.M. Entertainment. Their artists started the Hallyu wave
in K-pop and managed to break into Japan. The "Big Three"
occasionally cooperate, for example Se7en,
managed by YG Entertainment received a song from JYP Entertainment founder Park Jin-young in 2012 and
the representatives of the three agencies judged at the SBS reality talent show
"K-pop Star". The "Big Three", together
with Star J Entertainment, AM Entertainment and Key East founded the United
Asia Management (UAM), which aims to spread K-pop globally as well as facilitate
the development of better artist recruitment and management processes. UAM
auditions are global and not restricted to Korean talents. Besides
musicians, UAM also manages actors, directors, stylists, hair and make-up
artists. The merge was highly criticised as it might put pressure on
content providers as well as further pressurize other Asian countries, like the Chinese market, which is unable to respond to
and compete with the mass production of Korean entertainment companies.
In 2009, DFSB Kollective became the first distributor of
K-pop songs on iTunes. The recent overseas expansion by
K-pop music agencies has led to significant increases in profit and total
revenue.
|
Year of
establishment |
Record label
|
2008
|
2010
|
2011
|
2012
|
Source
|
|
1995
|
42.5
|
87.1
|
129
|
217
|
||
|
1996
|
51.8
|
70.3
|
96.9
|
|||
|
1997
|
3.1
|
9.1
|
17.8
|
13.5
|
||
Sales and market value
The Korean music industry grossed
nearly $3.4 billion in the first half of 2012, which amounts to a 27.8%
increase from the same period last year, according to Billboard. Before the digital market took hold, the South Korean music
industry was nearly destroyed in the early 2000s by the large amount of illegal
file sharing, a problem threatening other countries at the time as well. In
2006, however, South Korea's digital music market surpassed the physical
market, with more than half of revenue coming from digital sales. K-pop's
social media presence on Korean and English websites such as Facebook and
Youtube have also had a major impact on the size of its global market. Viki, the video and music streaming website,
has influenced global K-pop trends by providing translated subtitles for music
videos.]
In 2011, 1,100 albums were released
in South Korea. The hip-hop genre had the most among them at two-thirds of the
total albums. One-third of the albums were from other genres, including
rock, modern folk, and crossover. This shows that there is a variety
of genres in South Korea outside of what is produced by K-pop idols. Illegal
downloads have pushed down prices significantly. In 2012, the average cost of
obtaining a K-pop song in South Korea amounted to US$0.10 for a single
download, or $0.002 when streamed online.
K-pop is more than music or pop
culture, but it is a new type of business model. It especially makes tourism
work in a global scale. Fans from all over the world are coming to South Korea
for tours and this has contributed positively to the total sales and market
value of K-pop. Hence, according to Mfrascog, K-pop is "a model used to
drive geographical interest and spawn tourism."[139]
|
K-pop (in Korea) global music
market rank
|
||
|
Year
|
Physical*
|
Digital
|
|
2005
|
27
|
|
|
2006
|
27
|
|
|
2007
|
32
|
23
|
|
2008
|
24
|
|
|
2009
|
24
|
14
|
|
2010
|
21
|
|
|
2011
|
11
|
11
|
|
2012
|
11
|
8
|
|
* includes albums, singles and
DVDs sold
|
||
Trainee system
Cultural technology, or
CT, is a concept popularized by Lee Soo-man, founder of
the South Korean music label and talent agency S.M. Entertainment. It
is a 3-step process of exporting K-pop overseas as part of the Korean wave and consist of a tightly controlled
training system. Joseph L. Flatley from the American news network The Verge described
it as one of the most "extreme" systems of pre-packaging K-pop bands, which
are owned by a handful of entertainment agencies. The three steps to the Cultural technology described
by Lee Soo-man consists of the following: (1)exporting cultural products; such
as placing Korean singers in different countries, (2)creating international
collaborations and (3)globalizing the product by cooperating with musicians
from different countries to create a global brand. Lee's CT method makes the
singers to have different images and styles depending on the nation that they
perform in, thus allowing to target the specific audiences in the right way.
South Korean entertainment companies
such as S.M. Entertainment have
created a process to train singers and dancers in its groups. The journey to
stardom often starts around age 9 or 10, when tightly supervised trainees begin
dance and voice classes at night and live together while attending school. Besides
singing and dancing trainees are also taught foreign languages, most notably
English, Japanese and Chinese. According to the CEO of Universal Music's
Southeast Asian branch, the Korean idol trainee system is unique in the world.
To guarantee the high probability of
success of new talent, talent agencies fully subsidize and oversee the
professional lives and careers of trainees, often spending in excess of
$400,000 to train and launch a new artist.
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