SM Culture Partners

SM Culture Partners (SMCP) is a South Korean venture capital company wholly owned by SM Entertainment. The company serves as the technology business financier that would be involved in venture investment of culture- and tech-related companies through indirect investments.

History

SM Entertainment had its first venture investment move when it invested 18 billion won in the new technology business finance association, TechNext Investment Association No. 1, formed by Accelerator (AC) Future Play in 2018. The move was characterized by creating only "pure" private funds without policy funds for free overseas investment, which made Future Play serve as a tech advisor to SM.[1] SM's past investments have been criticized for persistent losses and low business relevance and has planned to set up a "specialized" investment company and start to "discover new growth engines."[2] SM once established a venture company that jumped back into private equity investment after withdrawal. In 2012, SM participated as a "strategic" investor and established SM Contents Investment with a capital of five billion won, but later sold its stake to Party Games in 2017.[3]

Investments

On March 29, 2022, Munhwa Broadcasting Corporation (MBC) announced that it would invest in Koy Labs, a Korean language education start-up, along with SM Culture Partners.[6] The company selected Koy Labs as its first investment destination after recognizing the need for "easy and fun" Korean language education.[7] An official from the company stated that they participated in investment in "anticipation of the effect of spreading the Korean language to the global market" expanding the fandom of SM's artists and communication with fans.[8] Both MBC and SM Entertainment Group plan to collaborate and grow Koy Labs into a global service.[9] Koy Labs intended to launch official services using the intellectual property (IP) of MBC and SM in the United States and Southeast Asian markets.[10]

On June 28, 2022, SM Culture Partners and Aventures, participated in an investment for Photo Widget, an iOS-only service that provides themes and widget functions.[11] The service has attracted a series A investment of 3.5 billion won from SM Entertainment Group and 1 billion won from Aventures with a cumulative investment amount of 4.5 billion won.[12][13] With the investment, Photo Widget has planned to expand various collaborations by using SM's IP.[14] On February 23, 2023, MineIs, a start-up that operates the used fashion shopping service, Charan, garnered 4.15 billion won in seed investment.[15] SM Culture Partners, along with Goodwater Capital, CJ Logistics, T-Investment, Schmidt, and SparkLabs are among those who participated in the investment.[16]

On November 13, 2023, Variety Magazine reported that SM Culture Partners, along with KDDI's subsidiary Global Brain, Sfermion, Laguna Investment and Foresight Ventures, invested $8,000,000 through Series A fundraising into the South Korean record label, entertainment agency and platform company Modhaus, which was founded by former SM Entertainment employee and ex-Blockberry Creative executive Jaden Byung-gi Jeong. Modhaus is home to the girl groups tripleS and ARTMS.[17]

native name	에스엠컬쳐파트너스
native name lang	ko
type	Subsidiary
industry	Venture capital
founded	March 15, 2022
hq location country	South Korea
key people	Jang Jae-ho (CSO)
owner	SM Entertainment (100%)
homepage	smculturepartners.com

SM Culture Partners

History

Investments

Programs

External links

References