WYSIWYG Acquires Drama and Entertainment Production Company 'Urbanworks'... "Strengthening Content Value Chain"

[Asia Economy Reporter Hyunseok Yoo] Wysiwyg Studio (Wysiwyg) announced on the 3rd that it has acquired the drama and entertainment production company 'Urban Works'.

Since its establishment in 2009, Urban Works has been a comprehensive content production company producing well-made dramas such as SBS's 'Running Man', CJ ENM's 'Let Me In', terrestrial and comprehensive programming, OCN's 'Bad Guys', KBS's 'Radio Romance', and tvN's 'Black Dog'.

Recently, it has produced numerous trendy entertainment programs such as STATV's 'Idol League', 'Timeout', and LG HelloVision's 'Our Neighborhood Class'. In particular, 'Vietnam Running Man Season 1' recorded 370 million views and ranked first in simultaneous viewership ratings, becoming a representative entertainment program in Vietnam.

Currently, it is securing a notable lineup of drama and entertainment content, led by a tentpole drama with a total production cost of 30 billion KRW scheduled to be aired on global OTT platforms. Urban Works has the capability and infrastructure to produce a large volume of high-quality content, and is expected to play a significant role within Wysiwyg's comprehensive content production value chain in the future.

In addition to existing content production, Urban Works is expanding its business areas into entertainment and marketing agency services. Kim Minju, a former member of 'IZ*ONE' and Urban Works' representative artist, has transitioned to acting and is expanding her activities as an actress. Furthermore, Urban Works is providing generous support and efforts for rookie artists such as Sung Tae, known from tvN's 'Hometown Cha-Cha-Cha', and Oh Jae-woong, the lead actor of EBS's 'The Moment Heart Shines'.

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Recently, Urban Works has been conducting comprehensive advertising agency services including model contracts, CF production, and media advertising execution for 'Health & Beauty', which selected actor Ju Ji-hoon as its exclusive model. Additionally, it continues to show active growth in marketing by conducting PPL with various companies such as 'Jeju Korea Tourism Organization', 'Lee Sungdang', 'Glam Farm', and 'T-money' in entertainment and dramas like SBS's 'Running Man', JTBC's 'In the Soop BTS Season 2', KBS's 'The Return of Superman', and tvN's 'My Roommate Is a Gumiho'.

Through its subsidiary 'Urban Works New Media', it is building a secondary revenue generation business model by producing profit-generating content through active business agreements with e-commerce companies based on its web content planning and production capabilities. This is expected to play a key role in the commerce business that Wysiwyg will pursue in the future.

A Wysiwyg official stated, "Urban Works is a company that demonstrates performance in various business areas including entertainment, drama production, new media, and marketing," adding, "Through this acquisition, we will be able to deepen the content production and new media value chains held by Wysiwyg and Com2uS."

He continued, "We plan to proceed with digital space business together with the parent company Com2uS and Urban Works as early as this year," and added, "We expect to generate synergy quickly right after the acquisition of Urban Works."