South Korea's largest search portal Naver has just opened a huge floodgate for the new generation of Hallyu wave with its live streaming app "V." Making its test run on August 1, the mobile app features up-to-the-minute information and interaction with today's biggest names in K-Pop.

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With its real-time feature, V allows fans to have more than just a glimpse into the lives of their favorite singers and groups, from backstage concert happenings to close communication anywhere they may be in the world. V enables fans to subscribe to celebrities' channels and alerts fans if their idols are currently on air. To further tickle the fancy of supporters, the app calculates the chemistry between fans and celebrities with its "chemi-beat" feature based on their overall interaction.

Naver has partnered with talent agencies SM Entertainment and YG Entertainment, with the former in charge of platform operations and marketing and the latter providing all the content.

First in line of the many Korean celebrities jumping into the V wagon are iKon and Winner, who debuted their appearance on the app with a 60-minute "unscripted" and "unedited" game show. Following suit are Wonder Girls, Kara, CNBlue, and Girl's Day (August 3), Miss A (August 4), 2PM, Eric Nam, and AOA (August 5), B1A4, GOT7, and Apink (August 6), Beast (August 8), Monsta X (August 9), Sistar (August 13), F.T. Island (August 18), VIXX, Jun Hyoseong, Big Bang, and Infinite.

"The V broadcasting platform seeks to provide a bigger window of opportunities to introduce K-Pop content overseas. We hope to create new Korean stars (like Justin Bieber via YouTube) while further promoting the current hottest stars through the platform targeting Asian markets," Korea Herald quoted Naver spokesperson Choi Seo-hee.

While aiming to reach a global exposure, V mobile app targets countries like Japan, China, Taiwan, Thailand, and Vietnam where K-Pop is widely popular. To do so, V's UX design, features, and subtitles are entirely in English. Apart from singers and idol groups, V is looking to tap Korean TV and movie actors and actresses.

Currently, V is available for Android devices only but will soon be downloable on iOS devices in mid-August. The live K-Pop streaming app will be officially launched at the end of August.

TagsNaver, V mobile app, live K-Pop streaming app, Hallyu Wave, Naver V app, SM Entertainment, YG Entertainment, iKon, Winner, Wonder Girls, Kara, CNBLUE, Girl's Day, Miss A, 2PM, Eric Nam, AOA, B1A4, GOT7, Apink, BEAST, Monsta X, Sistar, F.T. Island, VIXX, Jun Hyoseong, Big Bang, chemi-beat, K-pop