ITV

Category: Over The Top Services

  • Local language content drives higher audience engagement: Netflix’ Patrick Fleming

    Local language content drives higher audience engagement: Netflix’ Patrick Fleming

    Mumbai: Southeast Asia users consume two times more Netflix content than the global average, and India leads the charts, said Netflix, director of product innovation, Patrick Fleming at the ongoing virtual APOS summit on media, telecoms, and entertainment.

    The streaming giant currently has over 209 million paid subscribers globally out of which 27 million subscribers are from APAC markets. While that is a fraction of the total user base, it should be noted that two-third of its paid subscriber growth was driven by the APAC market in 2020. “We know that a substantial part of future subscriber growth is going to come from outside of the US,” said Fleming.

    Talking about the mobile-only plan, Fleming said, it has not been a success in all markets. The plan was first launched in India followed by Malaysia, Indonesia, Philippines, and Thailand, followed by markets across Asia and Africa. “We introduced the mobile plan in markets only after experimenting with the right entry price and discerning the demand for video content on mobile,” he added.

    Fleming said, “It is important for Netflix to speak more languages to cater to the APAC market. We now offer our content along with subs and dubs across 30 languages, so that a great show may travel anywhere in the world. For example, Thailand prefers dubbed content while South Korea prefers subs.”

    While a show like “Money Heist”, “Bridgerton” and “Emily in Paris” has done well in markets like India and Southeast Asia, local language content consistently outperforms in terms of audience engagement, he observed. In India, that means local language films and, in South Korea and Japan that means K-dramas and anime. Launching more payment modes has also increased adoption. Netflix recently enabled autopay via unified payments interface (UPI) in India and GoPay in Indonesia.

    The streaming giant has introduced a slew of nifty features that individually may seem like marginal improvements but are incredibly important to a mobile customer. The ideas first came in India and were then tested globally, noted Fleming.

    These features include a native brightness, playback speed and lock screen functionality. Currently, the OTT giant is experimenting with a function that plays a short vertical video clip when the user hovers above a title. “The idea is to capture the shorter moments of consumption on mobile devices. The user may not sample the content immediately but may put it in his watch list for later consumption,” said Fleming.

    Not just mobile, Netflix can be streamed across 1700 devices and Android and iOS operating systems (OS). Coding efficiency is vital when it comes to mobile customer experience. It was important that the Netflix mobile app was always in a ‘ready to watch’ mode, emphasised Fleming. Features like ‘smart downloads’ and ‘downloads for you’ were introduced to minimize memory usage and ensure that customers transitioned to the next piece of content seamlessly.

    Netflix has also partnered with over thousand local internet service providers (ISPs) to join their open connect network so that it may deliver a high-quality video viewing experience. It has purpose-built boxes called open connect appliances that have been deployed at interconnection locations to localise substantial amounts of traffic by ISPs.

    “Technology has come a long way in ten years,” said Fleming. “A decade ago you could transmit 1.5 hours of content with 1 Gb of data, in 2015 you could transmit 2.5 hours of content or an entire movie in 1 Gb, today you can transmit 6.5 hours of content or the entire first season of “Stranger Things” in the same amount. The same quality, fewer bits.”

    In terms of product innovation, Fleming is bullish about interactivity and branching narratives. “Audiences have loved our interactive content like “Puss in Book” and “Black Mirror: Bandersnatch”. We’re working on an interactive mindfulness series with Headspace and there is the expansion into gaming” noted Fleming.

    Netflix has launched two mobile games based on the “Stranger Things” franchise in Poland.

    “Mobile audiences are wonderfully impatient,” remarked Fleming when speaking about the need to deliver top notch customer experience on mobile. “We’re not just competing with other long form content platforms but any platform that offers a unique mobile experience.”

  • Over 66% of CTV users subscribe to more than one OTT app says new report

    Over 66% of CTV users subscribe to more than one OTT app says new report

    Mumbai: India is undergoing digital transformation and consumers are steadily moving away from traditional linear TV to Connected TV and OTTs – a change that presents an untapped advertising opportunity for brands and advertisers. As many as 78 per cent of people own a Smart TV and 93 per cent of these smart TV users access internet-based content found mediasmart- an Affle company in its latest report.

    The survey – ‘India CTV Report 2021 – Mapping Connected TV (CTV) Viewership in India and the Opportunities for Brands’ released this week documented this changing media consumption patterns of the Indian consumer with an expert view on the possible advertising potential of the CTV medium. According to the report, mobile-first, active, and aware CTV consumers are young, urban adults who are already mobile-first and are actively engaging with diverse apps.

    Nearly 89 per cent of the respondents are social media users, and 82 per cent are e-commerce, 44 per cent are gamers and more. Over 59 per cent of respondents prefer downloading apps via Smart TV App Store, while 26 per cent respondents primarily consume content via pre-installed apps and a small section (15 per cent respondents) use the dongle to stream content on TV.

    Close to 70 per cent of respondents spend between one to four hours on CTV watching movies (91 per cent), streaming music (64 per cent), playing games (47 per cent) or watching news (64 per cent).

    In terms of the pending ability and OTT preferences, over 65 per cent of respondents subscribe to more than one OTT app.  There is over 40 per cent adoption for the leading eight OTT apps in India: Disney+Hotstar, Amazon’s Prime Video, Netflix, Zee5, MXPlayer, Sony LIV, VOOT , and Alt Balaji. The inclination on app usage is also heavily dependent on seasonality and timing

    There are limited barriers to viewership and adoption. Unlike mobile usage of the internet, which requires literacy levels, CTV consumption cuts across age, language, and city barriers. By going vernacular, advertisers can engage with users in ads of their language

    Mediasmart, senior director, Nikhil Kumar said, “The world is moving towards immersive watching experiences and CTV is an exciting space to be at. It is interesting to see leading advertisers in the country adopt CTV advertising as a critical new addition to their media mix. CTV advertising is here to stay and with evolutionary solutions provided by mediasmart on Household Sync technology, we are powering brands to engage with relevant consumers across the connected devices.”

    India is a young market with tremendous potential for CTV adoption. CTV inherently is more engaging than traditional TVs and brings together the twin strengths of (a) engaging storytelling associated with CTV advertising and (b) targeting associated with Programmatic & Digital advertising. 

    According to Interactive Avenue CEO Amardeep Singh advertisers globally – and in India – are lapping up the CTV opportunity as it continues to grow as an exciting medium for digital advertising. “We have seen great results and ROI for some of our top clients who are already using the CTV ad technology from mediasmart. This research is a step in the right direction to build standard industry metrics, even as technologies like Household Sync make CTV more measurable and impactful,” said Singh.

  • Prativa Mohapatra named Adobe India MD and VP

    Prativa Mohapatra named Adobe India MD and VP

    Mumbai: US tech giant Adobe has named Prativa Mohapatra as vice president and managing director for Adobe India. In this role, Mohapatra will lead Adobe’s India business across Adobe Experience Cloud, Adobe Creative Cloud and Adobe Document Cloud. She will report to Adobe’s president for the Asia Pacific, Simon Tate.

    Adobe said its strategy for unleashing creativity, accelerating document productivity, and powering digital businesses gives brands a competitive advantage, enabling them to engage customers across every digital touchpoint. With a track record built on innovation, category leadership, and rapidly expanding market opportunity, the firm said Adobe India is poised for continued growth.

    Mohapatra commands over 25 years in the technology industry. She joins Adobe from tech firm IBM, where she served as vice president of digital sales for APAC. Prior to that, she led sales for IBM India and South Asia where she was responsible for driving revenue for the company’s portfolio of solutions and services. 

    Through her various strategic roles at IBM since joining the company in 2002, Mohapatra has a wide range of experience. This includes leading business transformations, scaling teams to meet hyper-growth and evangelising artificial intelligence technology with customers. She started her career at the professional services firm PwC India.
    “Digital has become mission-critical for businesses and Adobe’s market-leading technologies are seeing strong momentum,” said Simon Tate. “Prativa’s passion for technology, and ability to build stellar teams, will take our India business to the next level of growth.”

    “Adobe is uniquely positioned as an enabler for everyone- students, creative artists, small businesses, government agencies and the largest brands- to design and deliver exceptional digital experiences,” said Mohapatra. “I am thrilled to join the world-class team at Adobe India and propel our business vision in the country.”

  • The Trade Desk partners with Samsung Ads

    The Trade Desk partners with Samsung Ads

    Mumbai: Global tech company The Trade Desk on Wednesday announced its collaboration with Samsung Ads, a platform for advanced TV advertising solutions that can further help Indian marketers reach millions of highly engaged Indian viewers across the open internet. 

    The Trade Desk is expanding CTV advertising opportunities to India’s fast-growing open internet which includes over-the-top (OTT), music streaming, websites, and mobile apps, for the first time.

    Through The Trade Desk’s platform, marketers will have access to Connected TV (CTV) inventory on Samsung Smart TV, offered through its free, ad-supported on-demand (AVOD) streaming service, Samsung TV Plus. The collaboration will allow marketers to add Samsung CTV inventory to their programmatic media buy, said the statement.

    As more Indian consumers access digital content through multiple screens and platforms, CTV is emerging as the new, premium channel for India’s consumers and marketers. According to a report by Ernst & Young, CTV is expected to reach over 40 million homes in India by 2025, from seven million homes today. For marketers, CTV represents an opportunity to apply data to what is often the largest segment of their advertising investment.

    Commenting on the collaboration, Samsung Ads, senior director-India and South East Asia, Prabhvir Sahmey said, “India is fast becoming a programmatic-first market, with 74 per cent of total digital ad sales predicted to be programmatic by next year. For this reason, India is the first market where we are launching a programmatic first strategy. Our collaboration with The Trade Desk is integral to facilitating wide access to our inventory, offering brands the opportunity to extend their reach in a premium, brand-safe environment – the biggest screen in the house.”

    The collaboration will enable marketers to measure their advertising campaigns in a way that is not possible with linear TV. By applying the same level of data-driven insights that they do with their digital advertising campaigns, marketers can compare and measure ad opportunities across channels on the open internet in a transparent way.

    The Trade Desk India’s GM, Tejinder Gill stated, “Indian marketers are increasing their spends on digital advertising and steadily turning to programmatic advertising, which offers real-time measurement and better control over ad frequency. CTV, which is rapidly gaining adoption among consumers, is one of the best platforms in India for programmatic advertising. As CTV advertising does not rely on third-party cookies, marketers can also measure and compare the effectiveness of their CTV advertising with other channels on the open internet. We will leverage our global expertise to pioneer CTV advertising on the open internet in India, starting with our collaboration with Samsung Ads.”

  • Shemaroo Entertainment brings Lalbaugcha Raja to devotees’ homes

    Shemaroo Entertainment brings Lalbaugcha Raja to devotees’ homes

    Mumbai: On the back of its successful, decade-long association with Lalbaugcha Raja, this year too Shemaroo Entertainment, India’s leading content powerhouse, has announced that the festivities and poojas at Lalbaugcha Raja would be telecasted live across Shemaroo’s online platforms including their own OTT ShemarooMe. The telecast would bring the “LIVE Darshan” of Lalbaugcha Raja to the homes of devotees. Shemaroo will also distribute the content of Lalbaugcha Raja (video and images) to all leading telecom operators across the country as well as other online and DTH platforms.

    Consumers can download the ShemarooMe app to enjoy the feed of the LIVE Darshan and Maha Aarti of Lord Ganesha across screens whenever and wherever they are. Viewers can also access the telecast on Shemaroo’s subscriptions services on all DTH operators. It will also be available on Shemaroo’s Hindu devotional app ‘Shemaroo Bhakti’. Simply give a missed call on 9983371222 to download the app to watch Live Darshan free without any additional cost.

    Consumers who wish to enjoy the LIVE Darshan on their TV sets will have to subscribe to the devotional service from their DTH operators. LIVE Darshan will be available on Airtel – Om Shakti (Service No 674), Tata Sky – Devotion (Service No 1051), Dish – Bhakti Active (Service No 1069) & D2H (Service No 1203). Shemaroo will also distribute the live feed via some selected mobile apps & websites to reach out to maximum audience.

    Shemaroo Entertainment, CEO, Hiren Gada said, “We are glad that this year again, we have associated with the Lalbaug Ganeshostav Mandal to bring the Lord’s blessings to consumers’ homes. With the pandemic restricting crowds and the requirement of social distancing, we hope that the live telecast will allow people who are unable to come personally to take Darshan online. We are glad that we could harness the power of technology to bring the Ganesh Utsav celebrations live from the most famous pandal to them.”

    Lalbaugcha Raja Sarvajanik Ganeshostav Mandal, secretary, Sudhir Salvi added, “Our association with Shemaroo goes back to over a decade. The tie-up enables millions of people to take Darshan of the Lord even if they are unable to visit. This year, with the pandemic, we need to be more careful and adhere to the social distancing norms and hence the Live darshan will enable millions of people who can’t visit Lalbaug to take bappa’s blessings. Shemaroo’s reach across platforms will let devotees enjoy the Live darshan of Lalbaugcha Raja in their own comfort & we are thankful to Shemaroo for this support.”

    Shemaroo also won the ‘Best LIVE Streaming’ award at vIDEA 2019 for Shemaroo Bhakti Facebook page for the above offering. There was a hiatus in 2020 due to the pandemic, and Lalbaugcha Raja returns this year.

    About Shemaroo Entertainment:

    Shemaroo Entertainment Ltd is a leading global content powerhouse, which has played a pioneering role in the arena of content ownership, aggregation, and distribution. Shemaroo has been a core part of the Bollywood Industry and has managed to maintain many relationships with the best production houses over the years. 

    With a diverse and growing collection of over 3700 titles, Shemaroo has offered premium content and services to customers in more than 30 countries, across several Indian languages. With the brand in existence for over five decades, Shemaroo continues to redefine itself to respond to the disrupting consumer environment, by delivering content across age groups in genres such as movies, comedy, devotional and kids.

    Shemaroo also launched its own video streaming platform ShemarooMe in 2018 and recently strengthened its outreach by entering the broadcast business with Shemaroo MarathiBana, a Free-To-Air Marathi movie channel and Shemaroo TV, a Hindi General Entertainment, Free-To-Air channel that offers an exciting bouquet of highest TRP rated daily soaps to entertain the viewers of the HSM belt. 

  • Zee5 onboards Lloyd Xavier as marketing director, South

    Zee5 onboards Lloyd Xavier as marketing director, South

    Mumbai: Video streaming service ZEE5 has brought on board Lloyd Xavier as marketing director for the South region, as per his updated LinkedIn profile.

    Xavier’s appointment comes at a time when the OTT platform is focused on its growth and expansion strategy in the southern markets.

    Starting his career as an analyst with Deloitte in 2010, Xavier has over a decade of experience in the field of marketing, digital and social. He was last associated with Arha Media and Broadcasting as assistant vice president, marketing.

    Previously, he worked with Telugu streaming platform aha as AVP – marketing, Network18 as senior marketing manager, YuppTV as marketing manager.

    He holds a master’s degree in business administration from MIT, School of Business, Pune.

  • ReDefine celebrates its VFX work on ‘Chehre’

    ReDefine celebrates its VFX work on ‘Chehre’

    Mumbai: Global visual effects and animation company ReDefine has celebrated the delivery of VFX services for the Amitabh Bachchan and Emraan Hashmi starrer “Chehre”, the country’s second major theatrical release since the pandemic. The mystery thriller is helmed by production houses Anand Pandit Motion Pictures and Saraswati Entertainment.

    ReDefine contributed significantly to the film’s visuals with its scope of work involving over 200 crew members and also creating a great visual environment through the different stages of the day, as the film’s plot moved forward.

    The team from ReDefine was led by VFX supervisor Arijit Ghosh, successfully aligning with the director’s vision and executing state-of-the-art sequences including high-octane scenes such as a cliff breaking sequence and a major avalanche scene and quality CG snowfall sequences.

    “It is always a pleasure to bring a script to life, and offer our team’s unique vision and expertise to a project whilst building a close synergy with the director, in order to bring out the best output on screen,” said Ghosh. “While the filming was challenging owing to the limitations of the first wave of COVID, we were successfully able to beat any and all obstacles and produce the desired results. Our premier services to the project are indeed reflective of ReDefine’s continuous effort to promote great storytelling and create stunning visuals.”

    Launched in 2019, ReDefine provides creative visual effects and animation services focused on expanding international markets as well as independent filmmakers everywhere. It supports studios producing film, television, and animation content.

    “At ReDefine, we pride ourselves in our extensive experience and market leading technology, which has provided quality value additions to countless film projects and has been associated with the biggest names in the industry,” said ReDefine, general manager, Yohann Abraham. “Our work on the ambitious projects is reflective of our strategic undertakings and successful collaborations with the finest creative talents and production houses of the present day.”

    ReDefine is also providing VFX services to the upcoming film “Cry Macho” for legendary filmmaker Client Eastwood, as well as several Bollywood projects including “Brahmastra” starring Amitabh Bachchan, Ranbir Kapoor, Alia Bhatt, and Ranveer Singh-Deepika Padukone starrer “83”

  • DocuBay goes live on US-based streaming service Struum

    DocuBay goes live on US-based streaming service Struum

    Mumbai: DocuBay, the global documentary platform by IN10 Media has partnered with the US-based streaming service Struum to offer the OTT’s SVOD content to the US market.

    Under this partnership, the aggregation platform created by senior-level Disney and Discovery executives will allow consumers to discover and consume content from DocuBay’s library via a credit-based exchange system with a single subscription.

    DocuBay’s premium (SVOD) factual entertainment content across multiple genres like biographies, sports, nature, science, technology, and more will be made available. Some of the flagship documentaries are “Himalayan Gold Rush”, “The Creepy Line” and “WHO is in control”.

    The partnership will enhance DocuBay’s growth plans to increase the availability to more audiences – around the world, expanding its global presence and growing its user base, it said in a media statement.

    DocuBay, vice president, strategy, Girish Dwibhashyam said, “The digital streaming ecosystem has been evolving for some time and content curation, aggregation is increasingly playing an important role in helping users to find what to watch. DocuBay’s content reaches out to a vast set of audience from across the globe and this partnership with Struum will help viewers in the US sample our premium content.”

    Struum CEO Lauren Devillier said, “Premium content like DocuBay is an excellent addition to Struum with its broad library of documentaries from filmmakers across the globe. With this new offering, Struum subscribers will have the opportunity to explore an incredible array of films they might have not otherwise been able to discover outside the Struum streaming service.” 

  • Disney’s APAC head Luke Kang bats for regional content to push growth

    Disney’s APAC head Luke Kang bats for regional content to push growth

    Mumbai: The focus areas of the company in the APAC market have not changed much in the last one year, said Luke Kang, who was appointed as The Walt Disney Company, president – APAC, excluding India in 2020. Under his leadership, the APAC business has undergone restructuring with the appointment of a D2C head, spun off a division in Indonesia to grow the market and maximise the regional scale and in-market expertise in markets like Japan and China.

    Kang virtually addressed the APOS summit on media, telecoms, and entertainment industry in APAC organised by Media Partners Asia on Tuesday.

    The APAC market is critical to grow Disney+ 116 million SVOD subscribers globally, said Kang. The streaming platform has had a soft launch in Japan and will soon launch in South Korea, Taiwan, and Hong Kong. “The APAC market will contribute a sizeable share to the global subscriber base” he added.

    Even though most of their content is produced in the US, the audiences in the APAC market including Indonesia, Thailand, Malaysia and Singapore have embraced Disney+, noted Kang. “These markets have a strong affinity for global and regional content”, he said.

    “We’re not going to dabble in local content, but be a major player”, he emphasised when talking about the importance of producing content in local markets and supporting the creative economy in these markets. Kang said that first it would be important to understand the nuances about the customers in these markets. For example, he observed that consumers in Indonesia prefer to consume Korean or Japanese content. Those kinds of insights would enable Disney+ to make relevant investments to grow their subscriber share in local markets.

    “We are thinking differently, than we used to pre-D2C. We get a lot more data in real-time. We are learning that we need to be very broad,” said Kang, “We will be doing a lot of local and regional content across multiple markets, to make our service better, more exciting, more localised.”

    Speaking about the importance of SVOD business, he said, “SVOD is what you would call the ultimate scalable business. It is the one business in our portfolio where scale really matters. This technology allows us to bring the benefits of our global scale to consumers, especially, to consumers in APAC. Earlier, in the media industry, the content scale was global but it was difficult to scale distribution globally because you had a lot of walled garden ecosystems.”

    Earlier this year, Disney has decided to shut 18 TV channels in Southeast Asia and Hong Kong effective from 1 October. The reports indicated that the channels were closed as part of the media company’s focus on increasing its focus on the D2C business.

    Speaking about the move, Kang stated, “There’s a role for all media in the lives of consumers, although it changes over time. We’ve had to make tough decisions across the region when it comes to television. We’re making these decisions based on consumer demand, based on where the consumers are going. Consumers are telling us they want to engage with us on digital.”

  • Voot Select set to bring new series ‘Candy’ on 8 Sept

    Voot Select set to bring new series ‘Candy’ on 8 Sept

    Mumbai: Premium OTT platform Voot Select is all set to premiere its next original web series “Candy” on 8 September. The eight-part murder mystery features actors Richa Chadha and Ronit Roy in lead roles

    Directed by Ashish R Shukla and produced by Wakaoo Films, the show also has Manu Rishi Chadha, Gopal Datt Tiwari, Nakul Roshan Sahdev, and Riddhi Kumar in prominent roles.

    In the mists of Rudrakund, the gruesome murder of a school student pushes troubled teacher Jayant Parekh (Roy) and local cop Ratna Sankhawar to unravel a web of disturbing secrets that involve rave parties in the hills, cold cases from the past, malevolent demons in the woods and a hallucinogen smuggled under the garb of Candy. While one section of the society is petrified about the mystery killings and the rumors revolving around an evil force, the others try and solve the mystery behind the drug-infused candy sold to school kids. With infinite twists and turns, “Candy” is a thrilling journey through the world of dark secrets where sins dwell, shared the platform.

    “Ever since its launch, Voot Select has been synonymous with top-drawer storytelling. Candy, our latest original series, is yet another compelling story that audiences will be glued to, right till the very end. Candy marks the launch of our new content slate and we are excited to bring more high-quality entertainment to India,” said Viacom18, head – Voot Select, Voot Kids, and international business, Ferzad Palia.

    “Candy’s gripping storyline and top-drawer cast will ensure to keep our users at the edge of their seats. The thrill and excitement of the show will deliver top-notch entertainment as we look forward to creating more such stories that are compelling and meaningful,” added Voot and Voot Select, head – originals, Manjit Sachdev.

    “It was great directing a stellar and talented star cast for a show like Candy that is so intense and layered. Richa and Ronit have been fantastic and very collaborative. The show is intriguing, thrilling and will keep the audience hooked till the very end,” said director Ashish R Shukla.