Chairman Lee, Sooman explained stratagy about the new group in May 2011

In May 2011, Chairman Lee, Sooman delivered a lecture for Stanford University students on SM entertainment's business management strategies.
In the lecture, he introduced the new group which separated into two groups in one name, later EXO.

"We are currently preparing to launch two new groups one will consist of seven Koreans and the other will consist of five Chinese members.
The interesting thing about this is that the two groups will have the same name.
Now we are planning to launch the group simultaneously in Korea and China singing the same song in two different languages.
We plan to instigate this new idea of two seperate groups will be promoting as two parts of one bigger group of twelve."

(34:45~)