After BTS’ hiatus, HYBE to work on Weverse and NFT business
On June 27, 2022, sources from the industry mentioned that BTS' agency HYBE is almost ready with two new platforms, which can be expected to launch in the month of July itself. The first platform will be the new and improved ‘Weverse 2.0’ which will be merged with Naver’s V Live to include multiple new features.
The second platform will be a joint endeavour with Dunamu, the NFT Exchange. Addressing their latest ventures, officials from HYBE stated:
“We're aiming to launch the two platforms - Weverse's new service and the NFT platform with Dunamu - in July this year.”
With these ventures, the company is looking to upgrade its business model, turning special focus to its online platforms.
HYBE’s Weverse 2.0 brings together fan community platforms
Weverse, the web platform for fan communities, is on track to be integrated with Naver’s popular fan community platform, VLive. This merger with VLive will give Weverse 2.0 multiple new features like live broadcasting.
Other important new features on the list include mediums for fans to communicate with artists via fan letters, and personal virtual spaces for users to customize according to their preferences. Furthermore, Weverse 2.0 is also expected to have an in-application text system for fans to communicate with each other.
Weverse 2.0 is expected to launch in July this year.
More about the NFT exchange scheduled to launch in July
In the initial months of 2022, HYBE entered into a joint venture with Dunamu with the objective of developing an NFT exchange. The primary goal of both companies is to ensure that NFTs are divulged not only to crypto users but also to the general fandom community.
To do so, a limited number of photo cards will be generated. These cards will be digitally recognised as unique and exclusive, thus adding value to permanent collections.
Via this joint venture, both companies anticipate a platform that enables fans to collect, exchange and showcase their NFTs on the global fandom community platform, Weverse.
However, prior NFT endeavours by the company were met with a lot of backlash from fans who took to Twitter to express their discontent:
The company's latest business endeavours are predicted to manifest in the United States. Another one of its major building blocks will be the presence of artist-label businesses like HYBE America and Ithaca Holdings.
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Upasya Bhowal