GLOBAL STAGE HOLLYWOOD FILM FESTIVAL 2026 · RESPONSIBLE AI SESSION, PART 2
CEO Hailey Song in Hollywood: 120+ IP and brand partners, a 92% IP renewal rate, and a U.S. entry through local B2B partners
Millennial Works (밀레니얼웍스), a Korean AI fan-experience company, is building what it calls a “One-Click Pop-up OS”: a modular system that lets one approved IP experience roll out across many locations and countries at once. In the U.S., it will enter through local business-to-business partners rather than its own venues.
CEO Hailey Song (송유상) presented the company’s model on Oct. 3 at the Responsible AI session of the Global Stage Hollywood Film Festival at the TCL Chinese Theatres in Hollywood, then joined the panel. Asked how she would enter the U.S., she said: “Of course, B2B partners. The venue fee is too high, and everything is crazy in the States compared with Asia.” Running the company, she added, had taught her that local networks matter in every business.
Global Stage Hollywood is a nonprofit festival founded by former Warner Bros. executive Douglas Montgomery to build a two-way bridge between the Japanese and American entertainment industries, and it is held at the TCL Chinese Theatres. This year’s edition opened on Oct. 2 with a screening of 90 Meters. On Oct. 3 it ran two AI sessions; Responsible AI was the one led by Korean companies.
Tickets, not merchandise: Fans become the hero of the IP
“At a typical pop-up, you buy some goods and take a photo in front of a podium,” Song said. “In ours, fans experience the whole story as the hero of that IP when a new game or series comes out. So our business model isn’t selling goods or merch. It’s the ticket fee.”
In her presentation, Song traced how IP has met its fans over time. In the post-Covid stage, she said, fan engagement became visible and stood out, citing MrBeast’s YouTube channel, with its “subscribe for a cookie” call to action, and Dream Concert CONNECT:D (드림콘서트 커넥트:D), where online viewers’ faces filled the screens behind the stage. Millennial Works pitches the next step as offline AI experiences in which fans themselves become the hero of the IP.
Its showcase is SPACE:V (스페이스브이), its own venue on the second floor of AK Plaza (AK플라자) in Seoul’s Hongdae (홍대) district, where it staged “The Next Idol” with SM Entertainment (SM엔터테인먼트)’s virtual idol nævis (나이비스). Visitors went through an idol debut, from a 3D shoot to a personalized AI-made debut song. The first Solo Leveling (나 혼자만 레벨업) AI experience pop-up ran at SPACE:V venues in Hongdae and Busan (부산), and a pop-up for Huang Ama (황아마), a Taiwanese cat influencer with 1.5 million followers, ran in Hongdae. Each offered 16 experiences and events, including AI attractions.
From kiosk rental to IP theme parks: 120+ partners, 92% renewal
Founded in 2021 in Goyang (고양), Gyeonggi Province, Millennial Works began by renting AI photo, video and music booths in 2024, started IP collaborations on AI kiosks in 2025 and is expanding into AI theme parks this year. It raised a seed round in 2024 from CNT Tech (씨엔티테크) and Pacemakers (페이스메이커스) and a pre-Series A in 2025 from SM Entertainment. It opened offices in Japan and Taiwan in 2024 and in Singapore this year.
According to its investor presentation, it has worked with more than 120 IPs and brands, and 92% of IP partners renew. It expects 3 billion won ($2.14 million) in revenue this year, with projects averaging 200 million won ($143,000). It has run more than 50 pop-ups. Partner IPs include nævis, Solo Leveling and Blizzard’s Overwatch.
AI photo cards to AI staff, sold, licensed or shared
Its attractions are packaged as the Moment series: ANYMOMENT (애니모먼트), a photo booth that turns faces into characters; instantly printed AI photo cards; AI tarot; Music Moment (뮤직 모먼트), which writes a song on the spot; Alba Moment (알바 모먼트), an AI avatar staffer that greets guests in several languages; and Live Moment (라이브 모먼트), a 3D box for photos and video with characters. Results flow into merchandise such as photo cards, badges and keyrings.
Venues can buy kiosks and share revenue, license the software on existing screens for a subscription, or commission custom builds. IP holders pay by period and venue tier, through a fandom model with a minimum guarantee plus revenue share, or on KPI-linked terms. The AI runs on GPUs inside each kiosk using the company’s own models, so, it says, more generations do not mean higher cloud API bills.
“With global IP, you don’t have to explain anything”
In Hollywood, Song presented a Minecraft case study: an online game turned into a personalized, AI-powered offline experience, which the company ran this year at the Minecraft Adventure Village at the Goyang International Flower Expo.
The U.S. strategy rests on global IP. “We collaborate with global IP, so we don’t have to explain anything. There’s no problem with language or culture, because it’s famous everywhere,” Song said. “It’s very easy to enter the market at the beginning.” Moderator Jung Han (한정훈) of K-EnterTech Hub (케이엔터테크허브) noted that some in the industry call Millennial Works “the Disney of the AI era.”
Panelist Artem “Tommy” Petrov, CEO of CopySight, said large IP holders are increasingly open to fan derivatives and user-generated content around their IPs; Song called it “a very new way to communicate with fans.” Anisa Abeytia, a UNHCR Innovation Fellow, said “the public is not that concerned about consuming AI-generated content. What they’re mostly concerned about is how their information is being used” — a first-order issue for a business built on visitors’ faces and voices.
A first AI theme park in Seoul, then Singapore, Tokyo and LA
Its July investor plan calls for the first AI theme park to open in Seoul in September 2026, followed by Singapore in June 2027, Tokyo in September 2027 and Los Angeles in November 2028. It aims to grow AI pop-up stores from 30 locations this year to 120 in 2028 and AI kiosk rentals from 1,060 to 4,100, adding the U.S. and China from next year.
Outlook: The first U.S. partner will test the one-click model
The company’s pitch is that it no longer rebuilds venues and content country by country; once an IP experience is approved, modules can go out to many locations at once. In the U.S., as Song said, that will happen through local partners. The first partner’s IP and venue will show whether the model holds up under American operating costs.
For Korean broadcasters and media companies, it widens the options for IP. Secondary revenue has largely come from reruns, rights sales and merchandise; AI experiences that make fans the hero add tickets and personalized merchandise from the same IP. That puts fan data and the rights to AI-made derivatives at the top of the contract. Korea’s AI Basic Act (인공지능 기본법), in force since Jan. 22, 2026, requires generative AI output to be labeled.
Quotations are from the session on October 3, 2026, lightly edited for clarity. Unquoted statements paraphrase remarks made on stage. The author moderated the session.
Company figures and plans are drawn from Millennial Works’ investor presentation (July 2026) and its Moment Series introduction deck.
Currency conversions use 1,400 won to the dollar.
References: Interview with CEO Song Yu-sang (Hankyung Job&Joy) · “The Next Idol with nævis” opens (Hankyung Business)