2 days ago
- Entertainment
- Korea Herald
Hybe, Geffen Records launch second global girl group project following Katseye
Global audition began Thursday in Japan for next multinational act
Hybe is once again partnering with Geffen Records, a label under Universal Music Group, to launch a new global girl group next year, the company announced Wednesday. This marks the second multinational group to debut under the ongoing collaboration between the two companies.
The new project, titled 'World Scout: The Final Piece,' will begin with a large-scale audition tour across Japan. It aims to discover outstanding global talent and form a next-generation girl group for the international music market.
According to Hybe and Geffen Records, top scouting teams from Hybe will take the lead in identifying promising trainees with high potential. Those who pass the audition will undergo specialized 'K-pop-style training,' adapted for the US market, from October to December.
Selected trainees will then move on to an advanced training camp in the US, where they will compete for a spot in the final debut lineup. The debut is slated for 2026.
The entire journey — from auditions to the group's formation — will be exclusively broadcast in the spring of 2026 via Japanese streaming platform ABEMA.
'The program will capture how talented individuals grow while working alongside world-class producers,' Hybe and Geffen Records said in a statement.
The move marks the latest phase in Hybe's strategy to globalize K-pop by expanding its production model beyond South Korea. In 2023, the two companies launched the audition program 'The Debut: Dream Academy,' which led to the formation of the multinational girl group Katseye.
That project drew wide interest from global viewers, who watched contestants from diverse ethnic and regional backgrounds train and compete under Hybe's K-pop production system — a blueprint previously centered in Korea, but now adapted for the US market. The show became a milestone in exporting the K-pop "DNA" to the global pop mainstream.
