According to Investment Bank and legal circles on May 17th, Min Hee-jin proposed the acquisition of ADOR in a meeting with Dunamu officials A and Naver officials. Min Hee-jin reportedly told A, “Pressure HYBE to let go of ADOR”. Dunamu currently holds a 5.6% stake in HYBE, making it the third-largest shareholder with the right to appoint directors.
Also, Min Hee-jin reportedly contacted Naver and Dunamu during HYBE’s audit of ADOR. Earlier, HYBE confirmed that ADOR had illegally downloaded HYBE’s confidential trade information, such as details of artists and regional revenue, so they launched an internal audit of ADOR on April 22nd. This was a move to confirm CEO Min Hee-jin and ADOR’s attempt to take over the management rights of the label by attracting outside investors to force HYBE to sell their stake in ADOR.
HYBE reportedly found Kakaotalk transcripts containing Min Hee-jin’s contact with Naver and Dunamu through her PC during the audit. The documents included messages from Min Hee-jin, saying “A from Dunamu doesn’t even understand what I’m saying XX”, “Naver side seems to understand me well”, etc. HYBE also disclosed the conversation in which Min Hee-jin reacted enthusiastically to the plan to secure cash through a put option and purchase ADOR shares from HYBE through a financial investor (FI) proposed by ADOR’s Deputy CEO.
HYBE owns an 80% stake in ADOR while CEO Min holds 18%. The remaining 2% was shared by two in-house directors (VP Shin and senior creative director Kim) of ADOR. Therefore, Min Hee-jin must attract outside investors in order to secure ADOR’s management rights. In response to evidence disclosed by HYBE, Min Hee-jin protested, saying “I’ve never met any investors to take over the management rights of the label”. Regarding HYBE’s claim of her meeting with outside investors, the female CEO said, “I never gave any opinions regarding the management rights takeover, such as increasing capital and sales, because I was aware that such actions without the consent of the major shareholder are impossible”.
However, HYBE insisted that CEO Min Hee-jin deceived the entire nation with her remarks at the press conference on April 25th, and evidence has been revealing her lies.
Meanwhile, the preliminary hearing for the ban on HYBE exercising voting rights filed by Min Hee-jin’s side will take place soon. Min Hee-jin aims to prevent HYBE from exercising their voting rights and take her CEO position ahead of the shareholder meeting at the end of this month. If the court accepts it, HYBE won’t be able to exercise voting rights and cannot dismiss Min Hee-jin right away.
