SM entertainment

After graduating from Seoul National University and seek his own career as a singer, Lee Soo Man, several teenagers surveyed about what they wanted to see in music groups, that is when the group began with HOT guys, and the group of SES girls Both groups became successful during the late 90's.

Shortly thereafter, Lee created another group of boys, which was named Shinhwa, the group reached the same popularity and success than the previous groups.

However, problems began appearing in SM Entertainment following the breakup of HOT; Some assumed financial issues to be the problem, but the real reasons have never been officially revealed. While S.E.S. dissolved a year after that H.O.T. to.

A year later in 2003, SM Entertainment also see the departure of Shinhwa, in this case because the company just wanted to renew some contracts, however the members did not want to separate, thus following his success outside of SM Entertainment.

In the following years, some of the newer companies, such as Isak N Jiyeon and Black Beat, failed to reach the same popularity which achieved the first artists of SM.

The agency later found new successes in acts such as BoA and TVXQ (DBSK).

Besides marketing national audience, the two artists have been aggressively promoted in Japan. as part of the company's recent (blue ocean strategy) to export Korean talent to major music markets abroad. So managing to enter the international market in Asia.