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| (Image Source: Television Asia Plus/CJ ENM) |
Leading entertainment company CJ ENM recently announced plans for the 2024 edition of the world’s No.1 K-POP and K-culture festival KCON including its first ever stop at Hong Kong. The kick-off event of this year’s festival series, KCON HONG KONG 2024, will take place at the AsiaWorld Expo on March 30-31, 2024. Hong Kong ranks 6th in K-pop album sales and is emerging as a key location for K-pop stars to perform. This year is the first time KCON will be held in Hong Kong as a central hub for fans to experience KCON from more regions across Asia. The AsiaWorld Expo is Hong Kong’s convention center that features an arena with a maximum capacity of around 10,000 people. KCON HONG KONG 2024 will be taking the arena and conference facilities to create a multi-faceted event that features concerts and a full convention of exhibitor booths covering many aspects of Korean culture. The venue was also the previous location of the mNet Asian Music Awards (MAMA), the world's number one K-POP awards show, from 2013 to 2018.
In addition to KCON HONG KONG 2024, CJ ENM also revealed the dates for other KCON 2024 locations including:
• KCON JAPAN 2024, May 10-12, 2024, Tokyo, Japan
• KCON LA 2024, July 26-28, 2024, Los Angeles, California, USA
KCON is planning to visit five locations in total in 2024 – the most to host tentpole KCON events in one calendar year. Beyond Hong Kong, Japan, and the United States, KCON also plans to hold events in Europe and Saudi Arabia, both rising markets for K-pop fandoms, in the second half of 2024, with more details to be revealed at a later date. KCON plans to expand the scale of its K-pop festival in 2024 by reaching larger venues and building out stronger production to let artists and fans interact more closely. With more content and special programming specially curated for K-POP fans, KCON aims to strengthen its prominence as the festival franchise global K-POP fans can truly immerse into.
KCON, which has been a force in the spread of K-pop around the world, is a K-culture festival combining masterfully produced K-POP concerts with a convention where fans can experience every aspect of Korean culture – from music and fashion, to television and food. KCON began in the United States in 2012 and has since been held in Japan, United Arab Emirates, France, Mexico, Australia, Thailand, and Saudi Arabia. Over the past 12 years, it has amassed an attendance figure of around 1.65 million in 9 countries. Last year, KCON toured four regions: Thailand (March), Japan (May), Los Angeles (August), and Saudi Arabia (October). KCON LA 2023 was one of KCON’s biggest events, holding three full shows over the course of the festival’s weekend. These events set new records by attracting the largest on-site audiences ever.
CJ ENM Head of Music Entertainment Joon-beom Sim said, “KCON has not only promoted artists’ global expansion, but also led small and medium-sized businesses to advance overseas, and has become a festival venue where K-culture and K-lifestyle can be promoted and experienced. As the platform that unites and interacts with global K-POP fans, KCON this year will continue building on its legacy as a K-POP festival that reflects K-POP’s current status and proposes newness.”
