The Complete Family Tree of Entertainment Companies
Recently, news of SM Entertainment taking over KEYEAST has grabbed people’s attention. In this way, large entertainment companies are growing larger by the day. Here are the family trees of the top 4 Korean entertainment companies.
1. SM Entertainment
Beginning with SM TOWN, SM Entertainment has continued to join forces with various other companies to become the SM Entertainment they are today.
The three directly-related, public companies under SM are SM C&C (actors and entertainers), FNC Add Culture (affiliate of FNC Entertainment), and KEYEAST (agency for actors).
Meanwhile, companies that have a strategic partnership with SM include Mystic Entertainment, ESteem and Galaxia SM. Due to SM’s takeover of FNC Add Culture, FNC Entertainment is also listed as a strategic partnership.
Speeker is a joint venture between ESteem and SM Entertainment, which manages Lee Si Eon’s artist friend Kim Chung Jae from I Live Alone. Another affiliate not shown in the tree is Label SJ, which is an exclusive team created for Super Junior.
2. YG Entertainment
YG Entertainment’s representative affiliate is YG KPLUS, which was launched in 2014 after merging with a model agency. Labels under the entertainment agency include HIGHGRND led by Tablo, The Black Label led by Teddy and PSY’s own label, PSYG. YG also has many other affiliates outside of the entertainment business including in fashion, cosmetics, restaurant, finance, and merchandise.
3. LOEN Entertainment
LOEN Entertainment is a comprehensive contents company that holds Melon. After being bought out by Kakao, their name was changed to Kakao M. The 6 companies under LOEN are managed as labels. The largest Starship Entertainment took over King Kong Entertainment and also holds Starship X and House of Music. LOEN has essentially gained 4 labels by taking over Starship Entertainment. Other labels under LOEN include IU’s Fave Entertainment, Apink’s Plan A Entertainment, The Boyz’s Creker Entertainment, the indie label Mun Hwa In which manages Lena Park, and E&T Story which is the exclusive management team for Kim So Hyun.
4. CJ E&M
Although CJ E&M did not start off as an entertainment company, it is still one of the largest and all the businesses related to music under CJ E&M will soon be named Stone Music Entertainment. In addition to its various labels, CJ E&M also works closely with the production company Studio Dragon and JS Pictures.
