SM Entertainment Trademarks “CAWMAN”—Here’s What It Means
Eagle-eyed fans have spotted that SM Entertainment just filed a trademark application for CAWMAN—here’s what it means and what they’ll be using it for.
As of June 15, SM Entertainment has applied to trademark the brand name CAWMAN in four classification categories: advertising and business management, computer software and technical services, telecommunications, and entertainment business.
But what on earth does CAWMAN mean? If you’re a fan of aespa, you may have already seen CAWMAN mentioned before—though you’d be forgiving for not spotting it. During the end credits for the first episode of aespa’s new SM Culture Universe series on YouTube, the words, “Powered by CAWMAN” can be seen.
While SM Entertainment hasn’t released any new statements regarding the name, they did divulge some information right after “ep.1 Black Mamba” was revealed. According to reports from OSEN, CAWMAN is an acronym created as follows:
- C is for “Cartoon”
- A is for “Animation”
- W is for “Webtoon”
- M is for “Motion graphics”
- A is for “Avatar”
- N is for “Novel”
In short, CAWMAN is an integrated multimedia plan for the SM Culture Universe, a new project which brings together all SM Entertainment artists under a single worldview and storyline. As such, this could be a great future source of content for fans. Founder Lee Soo Man announced the SMCU back in October 2020, and the artists who’ve been incorporated into the concept so far include Red Velvet – Irene and Seulgi, EXO, NCT, Super M, and BoA.
With CAWMAN now undergoing trademarking, fans can expect SM Entertainment artists to appear in cartoons, animations, webtoons, novels, and more. The trademark application comes just as media and tech conglomerate Kakao is reportedly about to announce its partial acquisition of SM Entertainment. Kakao is said to be aiming to grow its content globally using SM Entertainment artists’ intellectual property, so it’s likely the company could help expand CAWMAN in the very near future.
