Bang Si-hyuk

Bang's passion for music began early, as he grew up in a musical home. However, he was discouraged from pursuing a career in music by his parents.[1][2] He went to Kyunggi High School before graduating from Seoul National University.[3]

Bang debuted as a composer while in college.[3] He met Park Jin-young during the mid-1990s, and the pair often partnered together as a songwriting duo. When Park founded his company JYP Entertainment, Bang joined him as a composer, arranger and producer.[2][4][5] One of their early successes was the first-generation group g.o.d.[4] They were largely responsible for the production of g.o.d's debut album Chapter 1, with Park serving as the producer and primary songwriter while Bang arranged the instrumentation and music.[6] Some of g.o.d's most famous songs arranged by Bang include "One Candle" and "Road". Bang's stage name "Hitman" originated from this period, when g.o.d enjoyed success as one of the country's best-selling and most popular boy bands of the early 2000s, earning himself and Park the reputation as "hit makers".[4] Besides g.o.d, Bang has also produced or composed for artists such as veterans Im Chang-jung and Park Ji-yoon, singer-actor Rain, groups Wonder Girls, 2AM and Teen Top, R&B singer Baek Ji-young, and many others.[4][7]

In 2005, Bang left JYP Entertainment and founded his own company Big Hit Entertainment. He continues to write, compose and produce for Big Hit artists, and he co-wrote six songs in BTS' critically acclaimed album Wings, released in October 2016. The success of Wings garnered him the Best Producer Award at the Mnet Asian Music Awards and the Songwriter Award at the Melon Music Awards that year. In June 2018, he was named one of Variety's International Music Leaders due to BTS' achievements.[8]

In April 2019, Bloomberg estimated Bang's worth to be about $770 million.[9] The BigHit IPO filed in October 2020 was the largest seen in South Korea in three years and skyrocketed Bang's net worth to over $1 billion, making him the only billionaire in South Korea's entertainment industry.[10][11] The success of the IPO, together with the commercial success of BTS that year, Bang's steps into diversification with apps like Weverse, and acquisitions of companies like Source Music and Pledis Entertainment among others, landed him on the 2020 edition of Variety's Variety500, an annual index of the 500 most influential business leaders in the global media industry.[12][13]