HYBE announced on the 25th that it recorded its highest ever performance with sales of 2.225 trillion won last year. This is a 3.5% increase compared to the previous year.
Although sales from the record segment (albums + music) which can be considered the main source of revenue were sluggish, the company achieved its highest concert revenue since its establishment as its affiliated artists held 147 concerts and 25 fan meetings.
During this period, operating income fell by 37.5% to 184.8 billion won. The absence of activities from its representative artist BTS due to military service, combined with rising costs from the debut of various new groups and diversification of investments, led to this increase in expense.
In terms of net income, which refers to the final income excluding non-operating expenses and special profits, it turned into a deficit of 3.4 billion won.
Looking at sales in detail, direct participation revenue was 1.4453 trillion won, a decrease of 1.8% compared to the previous year. The record segment, which has a significant contribution, decreased by 11.3%, while the performance sector showed a growth of 25.6%, offsetting the overall sales decline, according to the company. Concert revenue alone recorded 188.9 billion won in the last 4th quarter, more than doubling compared to the same period last year.
Indirect participation revenue was reported at 809.3 billion won, an increase of 14.5% compared to the previous year. With strong performance in concerts, revenue related to merchandise increased by 29.1% compared to the previous year, recording 420 billion won. The company noted that as the artists performed, sales of related merchandise and light sticks significantly increased, and character products inspired by members of popular groups such as BTS, Seventeen, and Tomorrow X Together received much love.
Operating income decreased by 38% to 184.8 billion won compared to the previous year, as the gap in team activities due to BTS's military service obligations and the change in revenue share per artist caused by the debut of several new groups affected the decline in operating income.
Expenses arising from investments in the debut of Cat's Eye in the U.S. and in workforce and infrastructure for establishing HYBE Latin America contributed to the cause. As new growth businesses including the fan platform Weverse and games began operating in earnest, upfront expense was also executed to secure mid- to long-term growth momentum.
HYBE is confident in improving profitability this year. The year marks the resumption of BTS's team activities, plus revenue related to the Weverse digital membership service, which started in December last year, is expected to be reflected in earnings from January when the free usage period ends.
HYBE IM, a game development subsidiary, plans to strengthen its publishing lineup through titles that attracted a lot of gamers' interest at the '2024 G-Star,' such as 'Architect: Land of Exile' and Bonfire Studio's new work, while sequentially unveiling many self-developed titles including the mobile puzzle game 'Puzzle Seventeen.'
The AI audio company Superton has officially released 'Superton Shift' and 'Superton Play' in succession. Superton Shift is a service that converts the user's voice into a character voice and currently has about 350,000 subscribers, showing stable growth. Superton Play utilizes text-to-speech (TTS) technology to support 150 voices in three languages and is being delivered in forms such as B2B (business-to-business) supplies.
According to financial information provider FnGuide, the securities market forecasts that HYBE's sales will increase by 20% to 2.6524 trillion won this year, and operating income is expected to surge by 68.6% to 341.5 billion won.