Lee Soo-man, Park Jin-young, Yang Hyun-suk: K-pop's founding trio still active in 2026
A2O LITE hits Melon #1 in 29 hours. FANOMENON targets 2027. Yang Hyun-suk breaks a 7-year-8-month blog silence. The three 1990s architects are all moving.
A2O LITE hits Melon's top in 29 hours
Three decades after building the idol-training system that defines K-pop, Lee Soo-man, Park Jin-young, and Yang Hyun-suk are each making noise again. The numbers are hard to ignore.
Lee Soo-man left SM Entertainment in 2023 following a management rights dispute. He launched A2O Entertainment and introduced two new acts: girl group A2O LITE and boy group A2O SOUL. A2O LITE's debut single NEON reached No. 1 on the Melon TOP100 just 29 hours after release—the fastest any debut track by a new artist has topped the chart since Melon's 2021 reorganization.
Park Jin-young's 2027 mega-festival push
Park Jin-young currently co-chairs the Presidential Committee for Public Culture Exchange. He's using that platform to push FANOMENON, a global mega-festival planned for 2027 that he describes as a Korean Coachella. The project would bring together all four major agencies: HYBE, SM, JYP, and YG.
Park framed the stakes plainly: "Just like when we challenged the US market with Wonder Girls 20 years ago, overcoming the limits K-pop has reached now requires the sacrifice of four companies and a national project."
(The Wonder Girls reference lands differently when you remember how that US push actually went. The scale of what he's proposing is genuinely new.)
Yang Hyun-suk ends a 7-year-8-month silence
YG Entertainment is approaching its 30th anniversary. On October 14, executive producer Yang Hyun-suk posted a long-form FROM YG entry on his official blog—his first such post in 7 years and 8 months. The post covered upcoming new songs from BABYMONSTER and TREASURE. It included an update on demo recording progress for next-generation boy and girl groups set for release within the year.
All three men built the industry's infrastructure in the 1990s. In 2026, each is still trying to shape what comes next.
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