SuperNormal is an Web3.0 company that has recently announced their official partnership with SM Brand Marketing, a subsidiary of the SM Entertainment Group which is a major South Korean entertainment agency. This is the first of its kind, making SM Entertainment the first Web 2.0 K-Pop company to make their breakthrough into the Web 3.0 NFT space.
So, what does this mean for SuperNormal, and how will this change the landscape of K-Pop industry and the NFT space?
In this article, we will take a deep dive into the business of SuperNormal, and how their developments with various major partnerships such as SM Entertainment can promote and bring about greater adoption of NFTs to the Web 2.0 communities.
Who is SuperNormal?
SuperNormal is a Web 3.0 company that was started to create premium art and to empower the masses through these art in the form of NFTs. Their very first genesis collection is known as SuperNormalbyZipcy, or ZIPs for short.
The collection was launched sometime back in January 2022 in collaboration with well-known South Korean artist ZIPCY. The collection features 8,888 generative pieces with over 1,000 traits all hand-drawn by ZIPCY.
The team behind SuperNormal also featured various established past experiences and backgrounds from Coinbase, Microsoft and Linkedin etc.
Owning a ZIPs NFT also acts as a pass that grants the holder with various benefits such as priority access and whitelist to all future SuperNormal collaboration launches, free merchandise, VIP access to all SuperNormal events and many more.
For full list of perks, visit SuperNormal’s official website here.
Artist Incubation Program
DreamGirls is SuperNormal’s second NFT collection that was launched earlier this year in collaboration with South Korean artist Kyu Yong Eom under their Artist Incubation Program. This program aims to provide a platform for well-known artists to showcase their work to the Web 3.0 communities and help them expand into the space.
This program is able to serve as a launchpad and a link bridge for artists like Kyu to expand and explore a totally different space much easily, and can potentially help up and coming artists from all over the world to showcase their artistry and work.
Collaboration with SM Brand Marketing
What does this mean for SuperNormal?
With this collaboration, it allows SuperNormal to make use of the IPs of various K-Pop artists and groups that are hugely popular around the world such as EXO, Red Velvet, NCT, and incorporate them into NFT profile pictures (PFPs).
This would allow both brands to expand into building a Play-To-Collect (P2C) ecosystem whereby fans around the world can collect their favorite K-Pop artists and idols in the form of NFT PFP art.
According to Allied Market Research, the global K-Pop industry is projected to reach $20 billion by 2031 with a growth rate of 7.3% from 2022 to 2031. With the popularity and hype of K-Pop expanding all around the world outside of South Korea into regions like the United States and Europe, there is massive potential to be tapped from this collaboration as it is able to bring NFTs into a totally different market from before.
A research conducted by iPrice, Southeast Asia’s leading e-commerce aggregator, as found out that K-Pop fans are willing to spend at least US$665 onwards on their favorite K-Pop groups each year.
Needless to say, the K-Pop industry is extremely huge and if executed well, SuperNormal will become a well-known brand even outside of the Web 3.0 space with K-Pop fans around the world becoming a representative of the brand while they support their favorite idols.
What is next for SuperNormal?
This year, SuperNormal will be launching Season 2 of their collection, and this time it will be on a much larger scale.
According to their website, this Season 2 collection features 3D avatar NFTs, along with wearable NFTs that feature 3 different tier levels. Each tier will have different rarity and can be used to customize their very own avatars. They have also teased that the entire Season 2 collection will be an evolving ecosystem that changes throughout the years with gamification.
This is something that we should be excited for, as it is similar to what CloneX has already done and it has projected them to become one of the greatest “blue-chip” projects out there with one of the strongest communities in the NFT space.
For those who want to have an early chance of getting into Season 2, currently they have a Mystery Box on sale on SuperNormal’s very own marketplace. This Mystery Box is the only chance for non-holders to enter early.
For more detailed information on the Season 2 launch, check it out on their website here.
They have also recently partnered with Kometh, a Web 3.0 comics publishing platform, that allow ZIPs holders to give a story to their PFPs and come alive in the comic books. This is also the same company that has worked with Azuki.
Not only that, they have also partnered up with HyperComic on 13th April to jointly develop large-scale IPs for the development and popularization of the Web 3.0 ecosystem for Webtoons and Webcomics.
Final Thoughts
We have already seen the success of CloneX who collaborated with Nike, which is a major Web 2.0 sports and lifestyle company, and it is definitely exciting to see how it plays out for SuperNormal and SM Entertainment. It will be a totally different ball-game but with huge potential as it will be the first of its kind, and considering the huge market for K-Pop around the world.
Season 2 will definitely be a game-changer for SuperNormal as it will be the first large project since its genesis launch, and features a gamified aspect of NFTs with full customizability for holders.
The team is also constantly building and seeking collaborations with top companies in both the Web 2.0 and 3.0 spaces to bring more attention to the project.
For K-Pop fans, this is definitely one project that you should keep on your watchlist!
Disclaimer: All projects mentioned in this article are NFA. Please do your own due diligence as investing in cryptocurrency, non-fungible tokens (NFTs) are extremely high risk investments, and should only invest what you can afford to lose.
