Munhwa Broadcasting’s Choi Moon-soon

December 2006

By Marlene Edmunds

The so-called “Korean Wave” is arguably the biggest trend to
hit the Asia-Pacific broadcasting market in the last few years. Korean dramas
have been racking up sales, from China to India, and delivering record-setting
ratings for broadcasters. The Munhwa Broadcasting Corporation (MBC) is among
the Korean players benefiting from this trend, even scoring slots for its hit
dramas Jewel in the Palace and Princess Hours in the U.S. marketplace.

Founded as a radio broadcaster in 1961, MBC began television
broadcasts in 1969 and is today the second-largest broadcasting organization in
Korea. In addition to its terrestrial services in Korea, it operates a content
distribution arm in MBC Global Media as well as MBC America, a division focused
on expanding the company’s reach in the U.S.

As president, Choi Moon-soon has the task of steering MBC at
a time when Korea has moved front and center on the world-media stage, and MBC
itself has become one of the more creative and aggressively international of
the territory’s media outfits.

MBC underwent a reorganization last year and the
international activities of MBC Global Media have taken on increased
importance, especially since its heartthrob dramas, TV movies and documentaries
have been selling very well abroad. Back at home, both the Korean media
industry and MBC have begun fine-tuning the production process and
incorporating a more international outlook from development right through to
post-production. Korea, however, is still grappling with some real problems
that are preventing full convergence of TVs, PCs and telephony, among them
regulatory infighting and a lack of content to fill the very pipelines its
futuristic infrastructure has allowed it to launch. Choi tells TV Asia Pacific
what’s up ahead for the territory and for the broadcaster.

TV ASIA PACIFIC: Korean
content is selling quite well internationally and South Korea itself is the
territory to watch for digital convergence. Why?

CHOI: Korea is a
small domestic market by international standards, but the Korean wave, known as
hallyu, has made our culture popular across Asia and has been a major factor in
allowing Korean content to move more rapidly onto the global marketplace. The
Korean wave and the increased reliance on regional content in Asia are to some
extent the result of a backlash against the tired fare that has either been
coming out of Hollywood over the last few decades, or has been mimicked in a
global standard heavily influenced by Hollywood.

Korea’s enviable position in the Asian marketplace is partly
due to the cultural similarities and geographical proximity it shares with
other Asian territories. There are unique expressions of Korean culture and
sentiment which have made our content appealing and have allowed it to cross
regional boundaries in Asia. There are certain cultural expressions of love and
emotion, longing and bitterness of the soul, merriment, and depth of talent. We
have Korean characters that express those feelings, which are often more
powerful and far more encompassing than the English translations of the mere
words might indicate. These powerful expressions of sentiment, however, clearly
transcend regional boundaries in Asia, and we believe that they will continue
to transcend international boundaries as well, paving the way for an acceptance
of Korean content globally.

TV ASIA PACIFIC: Korea,
however, still has a way to go before it really becomes an important player in
the global distribution market. What are your priorities in this area?

CHOI: We believe we
can better compete on the world-media stage once we strengthen our music and
score development, production capacity, and story development. We also need to
put more energy into powering up our documentary and animation genres, both of
which should be traveling more internationally than they are at present. The
amount of Korean content exported in 2005 exceeded $20 million, but content
outside of the drama genre accounted for no more than 3 percent of this total.
This clearly indicates that we need to make more of an effort in these areas.

For example, our program production is still very focused on
our domestic market. That focus needs to shift, starting from the development
stage on down to post-production, to reflect a more international outlook. The
export of Korean dramas is bringing in, on average, twice the amount of profits
of the initial production spend, and some dramas are earning as much as 10
times the initial production budget. Shifting our production capacity to a more
international outlook or even having joint production that is aimed from the
outset at a more international audience, rather than sticking to the “Made in
Korea” business model, will significantly improve our global
exports—including documentary and animation—over what we have
today.

TV ASIA PACIFIC: How
important is it for Korea to expand its production into other genres?

CHOI: Traditionally
in Korea, competition among broadcasters has been more in the area of news and
drama, rather than in other genres. And given the current focus on drama,
documentaries and animation have a difficult time because they are considered
non-mainstream and are allocated [lower] budgets. These low budgets result in
tight production costs and, at times, in lower quality. In other words, we’re
talking about a vicious cycle, but it is a cycle that can be broken. We need to
address this creatively so that high-quality documentaries and animation can
compete on the world market.

TV ASIA PACIFIC: What
regulatory problems need to be addressed in order to promote convergence?

CHOI: Convergence is
still a concept that is in the process of being redefined, and it appears to be
negotiable depending on the interested parties. The European Commission itself
admits, “Convergence excludes a precise definition but it is most commonly
expressed as the ability of different network platforms to carry essentially
similar kinds of services, or the coming together of consumer devices such as
the telephone, television and personal computer.”

One thing is clear. In Korea an in-depth evaluation of the
regulatory and marketing aspects of the content and I.T. industries should be
made before policy is put into effect. I.T. is more industrially oriented but
the broadcast industry plays a significant role in terms of the influence its
content has on the public and the cultural identity of Korea. This is extremely
important and yet cannot be measured by monetary means. It is essential
therefore that we do have a policy regarding convergence, but that policy
should be audience friendly and independent of political [governmental] and
economic special interests.

TV ASIA PACIFIC: You
have indicated that cable TV’s growing market share is threatening the
foundations of the domestic content industry. What can be done about this?

CHOI: Korea has been
rapidly [moving] into the multichannel and multimedia environment since the
late 1990s, and a fast-expanding broadband communication network has
accelerated this trend. The newspaper and music industries have been on the
verge of collapse as a result of the rapidly growing Internet business, but a
large part of this is because the analog-based “old media” failed to prepare
for the advent of digital-based new media.

Digital conversion of broadcast media has brought both
crisis and opportunity to the terrestrial broadcasters. When they [boost] their
capacity to produce content, and take advantage of digital technologies,
terrestrial broadcasters will create additional revenue and recoup any
temporary losses due to competition from the cable industry. If the terrestrial
broadcasters want to survive, it’s important that they create new digital
windows so that they can make the content that they create more accessible to a
new generation of content users who do not want to be limited by time or
platform.

TV ASIA PACIFIC: How
can broadcasters be encouraged to embrace digital platforms and outlets?

CHOI: Terrestrial
broadcasters currently depend too much on an advertising revenue model that is
rapidly changing. For example, growing use of the Internet and [fragmentation] of the audience have shrunk advertisers’ dependency on mass media. Unless the
government’s policy on broadcasting takes into consideration these changes in
the market structure, any regulatory policy addressing the content business
becomes meaningless.

The government is currently attempting to synchronize its
regulatory process with regards to media and convergence. It needs to ease
excessive regulations, including outsourcing of production and restrictions on
broadcasting hours, all of which are really no longer relevant to the
new-media, mobile-communications landscape. Moreover, there should be policy
discussions and public debate on the liberalization of multi-casting and
interactive services.

TV ASIA PACIFIC: Korea
often talks about Asian and Korean cultural values. What does this really mean,
and what is the appeal?

CHOI: Korea is a
country on the cutting edge in terms of technical infrastructure and I.T. The
Korean Wave and its music, clothes, culture, design and trendy dramas reflect a
country which is very modern and is seen by other countries in the Asian region
as a model for a prosperous future. However, compared with neighboring
countries like China and Japan, Korea also has a very stable and family-based
culture, which is rooted in its Confucian past and centered around respect for
the family, respect for older members of society, and for the wisdom they
possess. These are core Asian values but they are also values that have a great
appeal across the world. n