On May 6, CJ ENM announced that it will start planning and developing a K-Pop audition program for the South American market in partnership with Warner Media’s OTT HBO Max and global production company Endemol Shine Boomdog.
Through the project, CJ ENM’s Mnet production team will plan and develop an audition program in Korea for South American contestants. Based on Mnet’s accumulated planning and development capabilities for audition programs, CJ ENM will present content that captures South American sentiment through collaboration with Endemol Shine Boomdog. The success of the program will bring forth a male group with K-POP DNA in South America. CJ ENM is the first Korean company to create an audition program tailored for the continent.
In this audition program, K-pop artists and South American stars will participate in the screening process together. A male idol group selected through the audition program will be trained under the K-POP idol production system to perform on the global stage.
South America is a young continent with the population of a median age of 31, evaluated as a place with great growth potential for the entertainment industry. Notably, the South American music market has recently recorded an average annual growth rate of 18.9%, much higher than the global average of 8.2%.* Also, Spanish spoken by most countries in South America is the second most spoken language in the world. Success in the South American market is therefore deemed even more significant in that it can serve as a bridgehead for global advancement.
A CJ ENM official said, “This collaboration with HBO Max and Endemol Shine Boomdog is also meaningful in the sense that CJ ENM’s content production capabilities have been recognized in the global market,” noting, “Through collaboration with local producers, we are planning to integrate the local characteristics of South America into our planning and production capabilities for audition programs that have both K-pop and K-content characteristics.”
Meanwhile, HBO Max of Warner Media, an integrated media company, has shown aggressive growth since its debut in 2020, and officially announced its entry into the Latin America market in June. Endemol Shine Boomdog, a subsidiary of global production company Endemol Shine is a Mexican-based production company. It has produced popular works such as “Master Chef Mexico” and “El Vato,” which was selected as the best film in the category of foreign language US prime time program at the International Emmy Awards.
*Source: IFPI Music Global Report in 2019
