HYBE “The reason NewJeans couldn’t become HYBE’s first girl group is because of CEO Min Hee-jin”
During the process of refuting allegations of breach of trust, CEO Min Hee-jin mentioned NewJeans, the group she raised, as well as girl groups affiliated with the parent company HYBE such as LE SSERAFIM and ILLIT, causing a stir
In particular, her statement that NewJeans could not become HYBE’s first girl group because of LE SSERAFIM sparked controversy.
On April 26th, HYBE issued an official statement, saying, “The one who actually threatens the company by using artists as hostages is CEO Min. To protect shareholder value and IP, we want to accurately explain the facts behind the statements made by CEO Min during the press conference on April 25th.”
HYBE rebutted claims that HYBE had promised to debut Min Hee-jin’s group as HYBE’s first girl group but then debuted LE SSERAFIM first. They stated, “CEO Min is making inaccurate statements about the separation process from Source Music based on her misinterpretation. The reason NewJeans couldn’t become HYBE’s first girl group is not because HYBE didn’t keep its promise. At that time, CEO Min requested that she take full responsibility for establishing the group and insisted that the group debut under her label.“
HYBE explained, “HYBE respected her opinion and transferred these members to ADOR despite Source Music’s objections, even providing a significant investment amount of up to 16 billion won, allowing CEO Min to debut NewJeans as she wanted. During this process, NewJeans’ debut schedule was delayed due to the company’s split and contract transfer.”
Regarding CEO Min’s statement that HYBE hindered NewJeans’ promotion, HYBE explained, “LE SSERAFIM and NewJeans debuted consecutively, so there was not enough time for full promotion. Therefore, HYBE decided to set a minimum promotion period within a certain time frame. Additionally, in the case of Sakura (LE SSERAFIM), there were many articles about ‘Rumors of her transferring to HYBE’ even before signing the contract with HYBE. In this situation, if calling ADOR’s group ‘only consisting of new faces’, we are concerned that Sakura joining Source Music and information about NewJeans members will also be exposed.“
HYBE also emphasized that they did not neglect NewJeans’ promotion, stating, “HYBE is doing its utmost to promote NewJeans. Last year, HYBE wrote and distributed 273 press releases exclusively for NewJeans.”
On April 22nd, HYBE reported an attempted takeover of management rights by ADOR CEO Min, leading to an urgent audit. Then, on April 25th, through an interim audit report, they secured evidence of breach of trust by ADOR’s board members, including CEO Min, and filed a complaint against them with the Seoul Yongsan Police Station. On the same day, CEO Min held an emergency press conference to refute the allegations.
CEO Min, who claimed that HYBE lied to her, stated, “NewJeans was initially promoted as HYBE’s first girl group. Hyein received a lot of casting offers at the time, but she came (to ADOR) for this ‘first HYBE girl group’ title. However, they (HYBE) casted Sakura and Kim Chaewon without telling me. I was so angry to the point of wanting to resign, and even told them I couldn’t continue working.”
Source: Daum
