Big Hit's live-streaming joint venture gains reinforcements from Universal Music, YG

 
SEOUL -- A joint venture established by the agency of K-pop wonder BTS and Kiswe, an Americal cloud-based video company, gained powerful reinforcements to expand the global power of its digital live streaming platform, through investment by Universal Music Group, an American music corporation, and YG Entertainment, a major music label in South Korea.

Without disclosing financial terms, Big Hit Entertainment said that YG and Universal Music Group (UMG) would make an equity investment in KBYK Live, a joint venture with Kiswe, which creates real-time live streams. KBYK Live has launched VenewLive, a live streaming content platform that was used for BTS online concerts.

Artists from YG and UMG would participate in the platform, which is already known for high-quality performance content by utilizing Kiswe's multi-view and other technologies. Big Hit said that the platform can customize each concert experience to fit the identity and characteristics of each artist while providing innovative and original performance experiences.

"VenewLive has already live-streamed several large-scale performances last year and provided unique immersive fan concert experiences that can be offered through our cutting-edge technologies, including 6-angle multi-views, 4K resolution, and various interactive features," KBYK Live CEO John Lee said in a statement.

"This past year has shown that the need for reliable and innovative live-streaming has never been greater. VenewLive offers some of the most creative and memorable opportunities for today’s artists to globalize their art and performances, tailored to enhance the community and fan-experience," said UMG's chief financial officer Boyd Muir.

Big Hit's global CEO Lenzo Yoon said that his company would continue to study how new technologies and attempts in various fields can have a positive impact on strengthening the experience of fans. The alliance with UMG and YG came about two weeks after Big Hit tied up with YG and Naver, a top web portal service operator and IT company in South Korea, to create an integrated platform accommodating domestic and foreign artists.

Helped by the stellar success of BTS, Big Hit has become a top entertainment powerhouse in South Korea. With plenty of capital raised through its initial public offering in October 2020 and successful concerts and album sales, the agency is now pushing for aggressive structural changes to introduce a multi-label system and transform itself into an entertainment lifestyle platform company.