With increasing K-dramas and other Korean entertainment content, Netflix has made a massive investment of $700 million to produce more Korean content.
The new plan marks a giant step for the industry with more than double times the growth since 2019 when the streaming platform invested approximately $303 million.
The company established Netflix Entertainment Korea back in September to produce more original content in the country. Seeing immense growth to 3.62 million subscribers, the platform has created roughly 70 movies and series from Bong Joon Ho’s Okja in 2017, to Sweet Home just last month.
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“We are consistently working with local creatives to introduce more K-content to the world,” a Netflix spokesperson shared. Many of the original titles have seen global success, including Itaewon Class, Crash Landing On You and Kingdom. As of now, these shows are streamed to 190 countries around the world.
The streaming platform’s push into K-content has created a crisis for traditional local platforms like theatres and broadcasters. With a greater guaranteed audience base, support for large-scale production costs and no restrictions on material or expression, Netflix is now becoming the number one name for entertainment in South Korea with 80 to 100 production pitches every week, as reported by Hypebeast. A significant number of viewers have even removed televisions from their homes to consume content on streaming platforms instead.
In other news, K-pop group BTS’ Dynamite continues to break records across the globe and reportedly has now become the ‘longest-running’ Top 10 song due to its Billboard success. January 2021 marks the 13th non-consecutive week in a row that Dynamite grabbed its place on the Top 10 charts and beat out PSY’s 12 non-consecutive 2012 hit Gangnam Style for the title.
Dynamite has charted on Billboard Hot 100 for 19 weeks in total while Gangnam Style was on the prestigious music chart for 31 weeks, which is a record for the longest time by an all-Korean act. BTS’ 19 weeks on Hot 100 include three non-consecutive weeks at No. 1 and four non-consecutive weeks at No. 2. This week, Dynamite also scored No. 1 on Billboard Global Excl. U.S. and No. 3 on Billboard Global 200 while procuring No. 1 for the 12th week on Billboard Digital Song Sales. The Digital Song Sales record sits at 45,000 sales during the tracking week and according to past reports, is currently up by 183 per cent.
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