It’s no secret Simon Cowell is looking to recreate the success of beloved boyband One Direction and the next Zayn Malik is his top priority.

The former X Factor judge led the band to superstardom in the early 2010s and is hoping to find that magic once again.

One Direction – consisting of Harry Styles, Louis Tomlinson, Niall Horan, Liam Payne and Zayn – topped charts and won numerous awards during their six-year stint.

Simon, 64, has declared he wants to find someone just like Zayn as he praised the 31-year-old singer in a new interview.

‘[Zayn] was exactly who you’re looking for in a band,’ Simon shared with Haroon Rashid while speaking on BBC Asian Network.

‘He was a great singer, he was charismatic, he was interesting. He had a great voice,’ the media mogul continued.

Simon worked with the group from their inception to the split (Picture: Jeff Kravitz/FilmMagic)

He praised Zayn’s charisma and talent (Picture: Ken McKay/Talkback Thames/Shutterstock)

‘He always knew who he wanted to be as a solo artist. I remember his first solo single, thinking this is brilliant.’

Presenter Haroon asked if he was ‘looking for the next Zayn’ to which the Britain’s Got Talent judge responded: ‘YES! I want the next Zayn. Yes.’

His comments come with a tinge of irony as the Pillowtalk singer was actually the first to leave the band on March 25, 2015, leaving fans across the globe devastated.

According to Simon, Zayn was never too keen on the idea of being in a boyband anyway and even ‘hid’ from his boss before their live shows.

‘I had to find him, he hid! We were looking all around the arena and I found him and we had a conversation.

Simon is on the search for the next ‘megastars’ (Picture: David Parry/PA Media Assignments)

‘I said “Look, I get it, you’re nervous. However, don’t bottle it because if you can conquer your nerves, I think you’re really talented, you’ve got a great voice and I really think you should do this.” And he did it, and then of course then the rest is history.’

On June 4 Simon himself promoted the announcement by putting up an enormous sign that reads: ‘Simon needs you! Future megastars wanted for new boyband. No time wasters.’

Fans of One Direction (Directioners) have not been supportive of Simon’s search, especially after the businessman shared his ‘biggest regret’ over the band.

He explained that the What Makes You Beautiful singers have the rights to the name which was ‘the problem’ as he couldn’t use it for further projects.

‘If you’re listening, I’ll buy it back from you,’ Simon then joked on The Diary of a CEO podcast to Steven Bartlett.

Many fans feel the magic of one direction cannot be recreated (Picture: Fred Duval/FilmMagic)

Zayn was the first one to leave one direction (Picture: C Flanigan/FilmMagic)

This hit a sour note with many who claimed the then-young stars had been put in a ‘bad space’ and been ‘exploited’ by the industry.

Fans have seen the negative impact of this with each of the band members having both stepped away from the spotlight over the years.

Many don’t believe Simon will be able to recreate the success as it comes from the talent of each individual member, who have all enjoyed chart hits since going solo.

‘So next time, that will be part of the deal – I have to own the name,’ Simon added.

He also gained a lot of backlash for claims that there ‘hasn’t been a successful boyband since One Direction.’

Music lovers felt this erased the success of Korean groups like BTS and Seventeen, who just played the Pyramid Stage at Glastonbury.