MUMBAI: The free to air TV sector has soared ever since the Telecom Regulatory Authority of India (TRAI) announced the New Tariff Order for India’s pay TV ecosystem. How much it has done so was answered in the Lok Sabha.
Currently, Doordarshan has 35 operating satellite TV channels. This includes six all India channels, 17 regional channels, 11 state networks and one international channel.
In response to a question, Information and Broadcasting minister Prakash Javadekar said that these channels are available on DD FreeDish and “approximately 33 million households have access to DD FreeDish throughout the country”.
Additionally, the government has allocated Rs 234.51 crore to Doordarshan for content development under the scheme “Broadcasting Infrastructure and Network Development” for the period from 2017-18 to 2019-20.
MUMBAI: Tata Sky, India’s leading content distribution platform, has yet again expanded its portfolio of regional language services and is all set to strengthen its reach amongst its core regional audience in the south market. Partnering with COLORS Kannada, one of the leading movie content providers, Tata Sky Kannada Cinema has been launched with a ready line-up of 150+ films showcasing the biggest blockbusters and leading actors of Sandalwood.
The new service will bring an uninterrupted entertainment experience for viewers with access to ad-free, high quality blockbuster movies including the latest and classic films. The service also offers a world television premiere every month. Some of the upcoming movie premieres include Kirik Party, K.G.F., Bell Bottom, Hottegagi genu battegagi, Ayogya and many more. This makes the 24×7 Tata Sky Kannada Cinema service the best Kannada ad-free cinema experience on a DTH platform with 12 movie premiers a year before television.
Commenting on the launch, Tata Sky chief communications officer Anurag Kumar said, “Kannada film industry has seen a continued growth in viewership owing to high quality movie releases in recent years. With the launch of Tata Sky Kannada Cinema in partnership with COLORS Kannada, we aim to deliver the best curated content to Sandalwood lovers across the country, enabling a great regional cinema experience.”
Added Viacom18 Kannada Entertainment Cluster business head Parameshwar Gundkal said, “With a contribution of 13% of the total Kannada television viewership, Movies is an important genre in entertainment in Karnataka. We are witnessing a sharp growth in regional film consumption across screens. With this partnership, we aim at giving viewers more of what they want via a well curated line-up of uninterrupted blockbuster movies across genres, that will keep the Kannada movie buffs glued to their television screens.”
Tata Sky Kannada Cinema offers 150+ movies across action, drama, romance, comedy and thriller including both new blockbuster movies and classics such as – KGF, Kirik Party, Ayoga, Karva, Zoom, Chandu, Vaali, Yeradu Nakshatragalu, Habba, Yudda Kanda etc featuring the biggest stars of the Kannada film industry including Sudeep Kichcha, Yash, Rakshit Shetty, Ganesh, Ninasam Sathish, Rishab Shetty, Rishi, Ravichandran, Vishnuvardhan, Ambarish, Rajkumar among others.
Commenting on the launch, Kannada Cinema’s leading celebrity and Face of the Service, Puneeth Rajkumar, said, “We’re witnessing the renaissance of Kannada Cinema through original storylines celebrating the rich Kannada culture. It makes me proud to see this phase in the industry that’s encouraging young talent and creativity. To have a platform like Tata Sky Kannada Cinema at this time that curates all new and old films and takes it to Kannada speaking audience across the country is an added boost for the film industry.”
Tata Sky Kannada Cinema strengthens the bouquet of regional cinema services for Tata Sky by offering unlimited and high-quality entertainment, catering to the growing popularity and demand for regional movie content. As a part of this endeavour, the regional bouquet already includes 7 services – Tata Sky Gujarati Cinema, Tata Sky Telugu Cinema, Tata Sky Tamil Cinema, Tata Sky Bhojpuri Sanima, Tata Sky Bangla Cinema, Tata Sky Punjab De Rang and Tata Sky Marathi Cinema.
MUMBAI: The board of directors of Dish TV has re-appointed Jawahar Lal Goel as managing director of the company for the period from 17 December 2019 to 31 March 2020. The company has also informed that Goel will also continue to be the chairman of the board of directors post expiry of his tenure as the managing director.
In the BSE filing, it said, “Upon the recommendation of the nomination and remuneration committee of the board, the board of directors of the company at their meeting held today, i.e. 12 December 2019, have inter-alia considered and approved the re-appointment of Jawahar Lal Goel as the managing director of the company as per the applicable provisions of the Companies Act, 2013 and SEBI regulations.”
It further says, “While the board was inclined for re-appointing Goel for a longer term, however, in view of the above referred notification, the board has approved the re-appointment of Goel as managing director for the period from 17 December 2019 to 31 March 2020 (both days inclusive), i.e., the date till which he can continue to assume the position of chairman and managing director in terms of the applicable regulatory provisions.”
Goel has been leading Dish TV as managing director since 6 January 2007 and holds directorship of nine other Indian Public Limited Companies viz, Aplabs Ltd., ASC Telecommunication Ltd, Asian Sky Shop Ltd, Chiripal Industries Ltd, East India Trading Co Ltd, Essel International Ltd, Essel Infraprojects Ltd, Rankey Investments and Trading Company Ltd and Rama Associates Ltd.
MUMBAI: Chimp&z Inc in conjunction with Griffin Pictures rolled out a video recreating the magic of the golden era of television in sand-art. The #TumseHumareTaarJudeHai campaign video served the brand purpose of Tata Sky on the occasion of World Television Day. The video garnered a total view of 2.9M in just one day on Facebook and YouTube and still counting.
The video created by Griffin Pictures aims to highlight Tata Sky’s contribution to the evolution of the television industry as a service provider. Each frame created in the video depicts a symbolic phase in the timeline of Indian television. It starts from a box television set, highlighting the golden era and time-travels to the recent flat-screen television attached with a Tata Sky set-top box. The picturesque sand-art takes us back to the Mahabharata days, journeying through the soap-opera period and concludes with ISRO’s most recent achievement of launching Chandrayaan2 into space.
Griffin Pictures is the in-house production house of Chimp&z Inc. It creates cinematic content that caters to the advertising and marketing requirements of brands.
Commenting on the World TV Day campaign, Chimp&z Inc CEO & Co-founder Angad Singh Manchanda said, “This day is significant for Tata Sky as a fore-runner in the television industry. We wanted to do something out-of-the-box to mark this day for our partner brand in collaboration with Griffin Pictures. Sand art was the perfect option to depict change and transition and make the audience recall the many milestones in television history."
MUMBAI: On the occasion of Children’s Day, Tata Sky promoted their special service for kids – Tata Sky Fun Learn on its digital platforms in a nostalgic way. This feature comprised foundational learning for kids across different age groups. Tata Sky, along with their digital marketing partner, Chimp&z Inc sent out #BachpanKaPitara boxes filled with 90s games and activities.
The leading content distribution platform successfully executed this integrated offline campaign with an unboxing activity across all platforms. The box contains fun-learning elements like a bricks video game, spinning top, jigsaw puzzles, and toys.
Tata Sky surprised influencer moms and dads with the #BachpanKaPitara boxes. The influencers expressed their gratitude and appreciation for the brand with videos, that were later reposted on the brand social media pages.
The brand revealed a contest for its users on its Instagram and Facebook Page. The contest gave its users a chance to win a similar #BachpanKaPitara box by solving the mystery of what’s inside the box. Users could participate in this contest via Instagram and Facebook that went live on Children’s Day.
Chimp&z Inc is a dynamic multi-dimensional marketing agency that has carried out numerous online and offline campaigns for its partner brands. Its association with Tata Sky has been going strong for 4 years.
Chimp&z Inc CEO & Co-founder Angad Singh Manchanda said, “Our aim was to reach the target audience for the Tata Sky Fun Learn service that includes the kids as well as their parents. This campaign reiterates that playing games and being creative can also be a learning experience for kids. Not only this, but it also ignites a sense of nostalgia in the adults. We at Chimp&z Inc enjoyed the process of designing and executing this campaign and hope that Tata Sky followers experienced the same joy.”
MUMBAI: Prasar Bharati has announced the result of the 42nd e-auction for allotment of MPEG-2 slots of DD Free Dish on pro-rata basis for the period from 1 December 2019 to 29 February 2020. The slot has been sold to eight channels for approx Rs 18.9 crore.
The pubcaster has sold eight MPEG-2 slot to ABZY Cool in Movies genre (Hindi) under bucket A; Showbox in Music genre (Hindi) under bucket B; Ganga Biskope in Movies genre (Bhojpuri) under bucket B; WOW in Music genre (Hindi) under bucket B; TV9 Bharatvarsh News genre (Hindi) under C; ABP Ganga in genre (Hindi) under bucket C; Zee Punjabi in others (PUnjabi) under bucket D and MR TV in others (Marathi) under Bucket D.
The pubcaster had reserved the starting price of bucket A for Rs 3.11 crore; bucket B for Rs 2.73 crore; bucket C for Rs 2.23 crore and bucket D for Rs 1.55 crore.
On 4 November, Prasar Bharati had invited applications from satellite TV channels to fill MPEG-2 slots of DD Free Dish DTH platform on prorata basis for the period from 1 December 2019 to 29 February 2020 through the 42nd on-line e-auction process, stating that "The slots will be allotted as per procedure explained in Clause (r) of Annexure-2 of the policy guidelines for allotment of DD Free Dish slots, notified on 15.01.2019 and as amended vide amendment notified on 01.11.2019."
BENGALURU: Indian telecom major Bharti Airtel reported 17 percent y-o-y increase in revenue for its Digital TV Services for the quarter ended 30 September 2019 (Q2 2020, quarter or period under review) as compared to the corresponding year-ago quarter Q2 2019. The company says that with the adoption of IndAS 116, effective 1 April 2019, the results and ratios of periods commencing 1 April 2019 are not comparable with previous periods.
Further, pursuant to reporting changes in DTH effective April 1, 2019 (content cost becoming a Pass through expense) on comparable basis, the y-o-y revenue growth for the period ended 30 Sep 2019 is 17 percent (Quarter ended) and 16 percent (six months ended). EBITDA/ Total revenues is 43.3 percent for the quarter ended 30 Sep 2019 and 42.8 percent for the six months ended 30 Sep 2019 adjusting for the reporting changes.
Without taking into accounting the adoption of IndAS 116, Airtel’s Digital Services revenue declined 22.9 percent y-o-y to Rs 789.3 crore in Q2 2020 from Rs 1,024.2 crore. Operating profit or EBIDTA for Airtel’s Digital TV Services increased 41.6 percent y-o-y in Q2 2020 to Rs 560.7 crore from Rs 396 crore. EBIT for the period under review increased 70 percent y-o-y to Rs 3,243 crore from Rs 1,905 crore.
The company reported 14.2 percent increase in capex for Q2 2020 at Rs 205.2 crore as compared to Rs 179.7 crore in Q2 2019.
Digital TV Services subscription numbers
Airtel Digital TV Services subscribers increased 9.7 percent y-o-y in Q2 2020 to 1.62 crore from 1.48 crore in Q2 2019. Airtel Digital TV Services had 1.6 crore subscribers in the immediate trailing quarter Q1 2018. The company reported net additions of 181,000 Digital TV subscribers in Q2 2020. Average revenue per user (ARPU) in Q2 2020 increased to Rs 162 from Rs 157 in the immediate trailing quarter, but was far lower than the Rs 232 in Q2 2019. In US$ terms, the company reported ARPU of $2.3, $2.2 and $3.3 for Q2 2020, Q1 2020 and Q2 2019 respectively. Monthly churn in Q2 2020 was higher at 1.6 percent as compared to 1.0 percent in the immediate trailing quarter Q1 2020 and 1.3 percent in the corresponding year ago quarter.
Bharti Airtel Numbers
Bharti Airtel consolidated revenues for Q2 2020 at Rs 21,131 crore grew 6.9 percent y-o-y (reported increase of 4.9Percent) on an underlying basis. India revenues for Q2 2020 at Rs 15,361 crore increased by 5.7 y-o-y (reported increase of 3.0percent) on an underlying basis. Mobile revenues witnessed a y-o-y growth of 7.1 percent. Mobile data traffic has nearly doubled to 4,497 PBs in the quarter as compared to 2,478 PBs in the corresponding quarter last year. Mobile 4G data customers increased by 56.9 percent to 10.31 crore from 6.57 crore in the corresponding quarter last year. Digital TV revenue witnessed a growth of 17.1 percent y-o-y on an underlying basis (decline of 22.9 percent on reported basis due to reporting changes in DTH pursuant to the new tariff order). Airtel Business has sustained its performance on ay-o-y basis.
Bharti Airtel’s consolidated EBITDA at Rs 8,936 crore increased 40.9 percent y-o-y. Consolidated EBITDA margin increased by 10.8 percent to 42.3 percent in the quarter as compared to 31.5 percent in the corresponding quarter last year. Consolidated EBIT increased by 85.2 percent y-o-y to Rs 1,993 crore. Consolidated Net Loss before exceptional items for the quarter was Rs 1,123 crore. The consolidated net loss after exceptional items for the quarter was Rs 23,045 crore.
Company Speak
Bharti Airtel MD and CEO Gopal Vittal said in a press release, “Despite being a seasonally weak quarter, we witnessed positive revenue growth in Q2 on the back of various initiatives aimed at providing superior differential services through our Thanks platform. We continue to witness strong data traffic growth of approximately 81 percent y-o-y and added about 0.8 crore 4G customers on our network during the quarter. We remain committed to strengthening our network and providing a superior experience to our customers. On the AGR verdict of the Hon’ble Supreme Court, we continue to engage with the government and are evaluating various options available to us. We are hopeful that the government will take a considerate view in this matte given the fragile state of the industry.”
BENGALURU: India DTH major Dish TV India Ltd (Dish TV) reported 42,000 net subscriber additions for the quarter ended 30 September 2019 (Q2 2020, quarter or period under review), During the six-month period ended 30 September 2020 (H1 2020), the company says that it added 251,000 net subscribers. The company reported subscription revenue of Rs 79.2 crore for the quarter under review.
With programming cost becoming a pass-through item in the New Tariff Regime, subscription and operating revenues for the quarter are not comparable with the corresponding period last year.
Dish TV’s operating revenue in Q2 2020 declined 44 percent to Rs 893.18 crore from Rs 1,594.29 crore. The company reported a net loss of Rs 96.37 crore for Q2 2020 as compared to a profit of Rs 19.73 crore in the corresponding year ago quarter. EBITDA for Q2 2020 was Rs 540.46 crore, which was 3.7 percent lower than the Rs 540.62 crore in Q2 2019.
Company Speak
The company claims in a media release, that the seasonally weak second quarter came bundled with other external challenges this time. Slowing subscriber additions due to a not so robust macro-economic environment, price undercutting by peers, along with heavy rains and flooding in many parts of the country made subscriber acquisitions and retention a challenging task. Dish TV India however chose to be resilient making the best
of every opportunity coming its way.
“Setting aside the price undercutting resorted to by some peers in parts of the country, Dish TV India maintained a fine balance between subscriber acquisition and the cost of such acquisition. The company intentionally avoided adding extremely value conscious subscribers,” said Dish TV group CEO Anil Dua.
Dish TV CMD Jawahar Goel said, “It is evident that even in the New Regime, there has been a propensity to push low rated channels into bouquets with the objective of increasing the viewership of high rated channels. If the Regulation gets implemented in entirety, there would be better pricing that would ensure wider consumption of channels. Content would be subject to subscriber’s filtration and as a distributor we would only be procuring popular content that sells.”
Let us look at the other numbers reported by Dish TV
Total Income for Q2 2020 declined 44.3 percent y-o-y to Rs 896.77 crore from Rs 1,609.96 crore. Total Expenditure for the period under review declined 44.3 percent y-o-y to Rs 879.67 crore from Rs 1,580.35 crore.
Operating expenses in Q2 2020 declined 77.6 percent y-o-y to Rs 193.48 crore from Rs 864.77 crore. Employee benefits expenses in Q2 2020 declined 29.7 percent y-o-y to Rs 44.03 crore from Rs 62.62 crore. Other expenses in Q2 2020 increased 8.7 percent y-o-y to Rs 134.65 crore from Rs 123.83 crore.
MUMBAI: Major direct-to-home (DTH) operators spoke against the imposition of any registration fee or annual fee for the platform services (PS) offered by them. Tata Sky, Dish TV, Bharti Telemedia the holding company of Airtel Digital TV are of the view that as DTH operators already pay license fee and furnish bank guarantee, there should not be any requirement of any additional payment for PS. The companies have also delivered their views against capping the number of PS channels.
The Telecom Regulatory Authority of India (TRAI) issued a consultation paper (CP) on issues related to PS aimed at a proper regulatory framework for the services in late August. Before the CP was floated, the Ministry of Information and Broadcasting (MIB), in a letter dated 2 July 2019, sought the recommendations of TRAI on various issues related to PS with reference to DTH guidelines. TRAI also mentioned in the consultation paper that unlike private satellite TV channels which are permitted and regulated under the uplinking and downlinking guidelines of MIB, PS is not subject to any specific regulations or guidelines as of now.
As TRAI invited comments on the consultation paper from the stakeholders Tata Sky, Dish TV, Bharti Telemedia submitted their comments on the issue:
“Platform Services (PS) are programs transmitted by distribution platform operators (DPOs) exclusively to their own subscribers and does not include Doordarshan channels and registered TV channels. PS shall not include foreign TV channels that are not registered in India,” TRAI defined PS in its Recommendations on Regulatory Framework for Platform Services dated 19 November 2014.
Here are the important questions raised in the CP and the comments by the mentioned companies:
What should be the Registration fee/Annual fee for PS per channel? And how it is to be estimated?
All three players have commented that there should not be any requirement of any additional payment by DTH operators applicable for a PS channel as the DTH operators are required to pay entry fee, license fee and also furnish bank guarantee. They also mentioned in the submission that other distribution platform operators like MSOs, LCOs, HITS are not paying such fees which already creates a non-level playing field. Dish TV also mentioned that the requirement for payment annual fee can be imposed on cable platforms who are not required to pay any kind of entry or license fee to the government.
The maximum number of PS channels that can be offered by DTH operators:
According to the submissions made by the DTH players, there should not be any cap on the number of PS channels offered by the service providers. One of the reasons that has been highlighted is that DTH operators provide pan-India service and need to cater to customers of varied tastes and languages. Moreover, at a time when the broadcasters are having their own over-the-top platforms, limiting the number of PS would harm DTH operators in the competition.
“If the authority still feels that a limit is required, then it should be sufficient for us to grow further beyond the number of channels that we already have, and the limit should also be flexible going forward so that we may not be required to approach MIB and TRAI for cap enhancement. Additionally, for maintaining parity, similar caps should also be placed on MSOs/ LCOs,” Tata Sky commented.
Is there a need to revisit/review the earlier recommendations of the Authority dated 11th November, 2014, relating to keeping recording of all PS channel programs for a period of 90 days and maintaining a written log/ register of such program for a period of 1 year by the DPO from the date of broadcast and the role of Authorised Officer and the State/ District Monitoring Committee and MIB as monitoring authorities:
Article 8 of the DTH license condition mandates DTH operators to maintain the recoding of the programs carried on the platform for a period of at least 90 days at its own cost which is also applicable on PS carried by the operators. In addition to that, all the content transmitted by DTH operators are monitored by the Electronic Media Monitor Center which is entrusted with the responsibility to check the compliance of the ‘Programme and Advertisement Code’ under the Cable TV Network (Regulation) Act, 1995. Hence, they are of the view that there is no requirement for prescription of any additional compliance maintaining a written log/ register of such program for a period of one year by the DPO.
MUMBAI: Strengthening its technology product portfolio, Dish TV India Ltd., world’s largest single-country DTH Company, today launched a complete range of smart devices, an internet enabled Android based HD Set Top Box and Voice enabled Alexa Built-in smart kit.
Eliminating the hassle of switching between linear TV and OTT apps, the latest offerings from Dish TV India effectively aim to combine the two through a single entertainment device. This new technologically advanced offering – an internet enabled Android based HD Set Top Box ‘Dish SMRT Hub’ is available at a price of INR 3999 for new subscribers & INR 2499 for existing subscribers.
Dish SMRT Hub is Android HD set top box which runs on Android TV operating system by Google. The devices are using Android TV™ 9.0 and have been designed to deliver best in class picture quality and sound to the viewers. It will also offer access to the Google Play Store and Google Assistant allowing the users to download and stream content from all popular OTT platforms. The new offerings from Dish TV India will support all popular OTT platforms like Watcho, Amazon Prime Video, Zee5, Voot, ALTBalaji and YouTube etc.
With built-in Google Assistant & Chromecast and superior Dolby audio, the Android HD set top box extends the ultimate cinematic experience to viewers in the comfort of their homes. A user can stream content from any device directly to the TV screen without any lag. Now Users can download thousands of apps and Play games right on their TV without needing an additional gaming console. Adding to the seamless experience, the Dish SMRT Hub further allow users to operate and control the device using simple voice commands. Available with native support for video content OTT platforms, the Integrated Google assistant converts this box into a smart home hub, enabling the users to control their smart homes with a single remote.
The Android based set top box will work on any television and support OTT platforms Watcho, ZEE5, Amazon Prime Video, Voot, ALTBalaji and YouTube to name a few.
Dish SMRT Kit – the voice enabled kit with a dongle and remote powered by Amazon Alexa are priced at INR 1199 and available for existing DishTV subscribers. This allows subscribers to access popular OTT Apps and thousands of Alexa skills on their existing set top boxes.
The Dish SMRT Kit with Alexa-powered remote control will help users seamlessly bridge the gap between real-time TV content and best of engaging content available online. The super affordable Dish SMRT Kit comprising Wi-Fi dongle, a Bluetooth and a sleek looking Alexa-enabled remote control, provides access to thousands of Alexa skills. These skills will help users to use voice as an intuitive and preferred mode of
interaction on their set top boxes to book cabs, get latest news, information & recipes, set reminders for their favorite programs, get recommendations on trending programs, access their account details, register ‘call me’ request, discover movies, sports & music and also control smart home devices just through voice commands. To get started, customers will need to set up the smart kits with their Amazon account. Once set up, customers can simply say – 'Alexa, tell me the news’, ‘Alexa, what’s the cricket score?’ OR ‘Alexa, play latest Bollywood songs’, to enjoy a voice-controlled experience.
Further, DishTV has tied-up with HANDAN, who is manufacturing partner for DishTV, worked extensively on this project to bring in voice functionality in DishTV STB’s.
Commenting on the launch of these new products, Mr. Anil Dua, Executive Director & Group CEO, Dish TV India Limited, said, “We are delighted to launch the most advanced Android powered Set Top Box and the Alexa Built-in smart kit for DishTV customers and this is a significant milestone for Dish TV India. The Dish SMRT Hub is a customized device which allows users to have uninterrupted video streaming and access to TV content. It is capable of delivering superior viewing experience owing to its immersive features like in-built Google Assistant, Chromecast and myriad other smart features. The Dish SMRT Kit is a big add-on to our current STB’s and with this our customers can enjoy the ease of using voice commands for accessing information through Alexa for all their needs. With these launches DishTV is making a strong statement of providing best-in-class technology and experience to its customers.”
Recently, Dish TV India Limited had also introduced SMRT Stick, allowing users to stream content from OTT services through Dish TV set top box. Additionally, focusing on premium short format content, the company forayed into OTT space earlier this year by launching its own OTT platform, ‘Watcho’. With this DishTV takes another step towards providing entertainment across linear and online sources on any screen for customers across all segments.
