Kakao Entertainment and Atlantic Music Group team up to build K-pop acts for the world from day one

Kakao Entertainment, the South Korean company behind a large slice of K-pop's labels, management and fan platforms, has struck a global partnership with Atlantic Music Group (AMG), the label group owned by Warner Music Group. The deal was announced on 7 October 2026.

The idea is simple: plan K-pop acts for the world from the start, instead of taking a finished Korean act abroad later. The two companies say they will shape strategy for artists "from the earliest stages" of their careers, with Kakao Entertainment bringing its experience in music planning and production, distribution, artist management, marketing and fan engagement, and AMG bringing its A&R, marketing and promotion teams and its global network.

What the deal covers

The partnership spans music production, distribution, marketing and promotion. In practice that means song camps, featured collaborations with artists on AMG's roster, streaming and social media campaigns, TV and radio placements, and fan engagement work around releases.

Joseph Chang, who runs Kakao Entertainment America and serves as the company's global strategy officer, is leading for Kakao. Elliot Grainge, chairman and CEO of AMG, is leading for the label group. Both have framed it as a way to open more routes for Korean artists to reach wider audiences and build lasting careers outside Korea. Financial terms were not disclosed, and no specific artists have been named yet.

Why it matters

AMG is not new to K-pop. Its label Atlantic Records released ROSÉ's "APT." with Bruno Mars, one of the biggest K-pop crossover songs of recent years, and the group has built a reputation for breaking new acts as well as running established ones such as Bruno Mars, Ed Sheeran and Coldplay.

For Kakao, a US major partner for development rather than just distribution is a bigger bet. Song camps in particular, where Korean and Western writers and producers are put in a room together, tend to decide what a group sounds like long before a debut. Doing that with a major label's network in the room is the real signal here.

For readers new to the scene: Kakao Entertainment is one of Korea's largest entertainment companies, with labels, management agencies and a music and fan ecosystem under one roof. Deals like this one are how K-pop's industry keeps widening its reach beyond Seoul.

We will update this story when the first artists or projects under the partnership are named. Find Bruno Mars on his ADMC artist page.