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Leonard Lim is bringing global entertainment company WILD to the Philippines as he continues his efforts to create international opportunities for Southeast Asian talents.

Leonard Lim is no stranger to the world of entertainment. He has a long experience working in the burgeoning Korean pop music industry, organizing events with some of the biggest K-pop stars.

Spending four years in the entertainment industry, he realized that much of the support for this growing economy came from Southeast Asia. He witnessed a lot of K-pop influence being adopted in this region, as well as the development of fandom culture, in which the same type of behavior this region showed towards the local stars he sees in K-pop idols.

He turned this idea into a chance to build a hybrid management, creating opportunities for Southeast Asian, East Asian, and other international talents to go global.

WILD Entertainment, a hub for international talents

In 2020, Leonard founded WILD Group in South Korea with a vision to help Southeast Asian artists in finding a place in the South Korean entertainment industry. Over time, he is putting effort into building WILD as a company for international talents.

WILD's global roster of talents varies from actors, singers, hosts, content creators, and more. It continues to expand its brand beyond its platforms by producing diverse content for its artists, breaking through the traditional music market.

"We try to be as creative as possible, we signed a bunch of K-pop stars that came out of K-pop. What we're trying to do is we're trying to promote them in a way that they've never experienced before and in a more Western way," Leonard shared in an exclusive interview with GMANetwork.com.

He continued, "They're so used to doing their promotional shows, their comebacks, all that type of stuff, but we're trying to give them a more Western or Southeast Asian experience to promote as an artist. So I think that that's what makes us a little bit different.

"A lot of K-pop artists are able to get like a more hybrid company, as opposed to after their K-pop company or K-pop term ends, they continue doing K-pop, or they go right into the Western entertainment company. We're right in the middle where we understand K-pop and we understand Western, and we try to give them the best in both worlds."

This global entertainment company, marketing agency, and music label has already stretched its initiative in other countries. Last year, WILD moved its new headquarters from South Korea to Singapore.

It now operates in three divisions: first, a record label with six recording artists; second, a management division with 30 artists, music producers, and content creators that they exclusively manage; and third, a talent agency network division with over 120 content creators worldwide.

Bringing WILD Entertainment to the Philippines

Leonard has already set his sights on Filipino talents since establishing WILD. This year, he is expanding his regional office in the Philippines, providing opportunities for potential Filipinos to go global.

"We hope to be doing a lot of big projects with some local artists in the Philippines. To be honest, I think that's a big thing for us. And we plan on hopefully finding some of the future talents in the Philippines that have a global appeal and trying to promote them not only in their home country but also outside," Leonard said.

He believes that there is a huge opportunity for Southeast Asian talents to be recognized on the same global scale as successful South Korean idols.

"So the reason why I moved the headquarters from Korea to Singapore is I see it as a massive opportunity for Asian or Southeast Asian entertainment to be recognized globally on a global scale. Having worked around K-pop and I worked in the K-pop industry for the last four years, I realized that a lot of the support comes from Southeast Asia, and one of those big regions is the Philippines.

"What I've noticed is that a lot of the culture from K-pop is being adopted in regions like the Philippines and Thailand, specifically, the Philippines has that group SB19 now and I see a fandom culture being developed. I see whenever there are K-pop idols come to the Philippines, the same type of behavior is shown towards your local idols now, as well as K-pop idols. And in fact, your local idols are selling just as many tickets and getting as much support as K-pop idols. So I see that like the success of BTS and BLACKPINK, there is a huge opportunity for Southeast Asian artists to be recognized on that same global scale. That's what I truly believe," he shared.

Asked what to expect from WILD in the coming days, Leonard shared that they are preparing a lot of music.

"In the past two months, we signed on a lot of very high, prominent, high-profile artists and celebrities. From every single one of those artists, you can expect them to do more promotion outside of Korea in the Southeast Asian region. When I say Southeast Asian, I mean Singapore, Malaysia, Philippines, Thailand, and Indonesia, these five countries. We're planning live events coming in [quarter] three [of 2023] and also [quarter] one of 2024."