ITV

Category: Over The Top Services

  • TVF strengthens partnership with MX Player, releases FLAMES S2 & FATHERS Vol.2

    TVF strengthens partnership with MX Player, releases FLAMES S2 & FATHERS Vol.2

    MUMBAI: The Viral Fever (TVF) along with MX Player has launched the second chapters of 2 iconic web series’ – FLAMES and FATHERS. The partnership between the two platforms allows the acclaimed shows from TVF, who are pioneers of Indian web entertainment content to penetrate a larger audience base with MX Player’s massive 75 million daily active users. While FLAMES S2 went live on 18 October, FATHERS Vol.2 will stream starting 25 October with both shows being available on TVFPlay and MX Player.

    Directed by Apoorv Singh Karki, FLAMES S2 is based on an innocent young college romance that see the Rajat and Ishita’s relationship evolve as they experience the many firsts in their relationship. FATHERS Vol.2, directed by Prem Mistry, on the other hand, is a laugh out loud show about 3 middle-aged fathers who want to live the GenZ life while trying to make sense of the idiocrasies associated with the younger lot.

    On the partnership, The Viral Fever  president and COO Karan Chaudhary said, “The phenomenal success we witnessed with the season 1 of FLAMES & FATHERS validates our vision of creating clutter-breaking relatable content for our audience. Partnering with the leading OTT platform like MX Player fuels our ambition of recruiting newer audience while, of course, keeping our loyal consumers glued to our content through TVFPlay. It is heartening to see our shows being readily consumed by more and more viewers which motivates us to continuously create more meaningful content”

    Elaborating on the same, MX Player head of acquisitions Mansi Shrivastav said, "While building our content library, our vision is to bring to the fore great stories that are designed to entertain audiences across any time of the day & for any mood & preference. Keeping this in mind our MX Exclusives are carefully handpicked & curated. More so, having TVF as a partner has helped us broaden our consumer profile and reach out to a younger TG.”

    Recognised as one of the pioneers of breakthrough branded content, TVF features as one of the first choices among brands to engage and deliver their key message in an effective manner. As one of the first digital production companies in the country and with 4 of its web series rated in IMDB’s Top 250 shows of all-time list, makes TVF one of the most visited digital platforms in the country. 

    Binge watch FLAMES S2 here: https://tvfplay.com/show/flames-by-the-timeliners/266

    Watch the trailers of FATHERS S2 here: https://tvfplay.com/video/tvfs-fathers/n/3052

  • Struggling telco operator BSNL strikes content deal with YuppTV

    Struggling telco operator BSNL strikes content deal with YuppTV

    MUMBAI: State owned telecom operator Bharat Sanchar Nigam Ltd (BSNL) and over-the-top (OTT) platform YuppTV have entered into a partnership. Under the signed memorandum of understanding (MoU), Yupp TV content will be made available to both BSNL mobile broadband and fixed line users.

    “BSNL has 120 million users. Yupp brings content on global scale. We will work on a very unique proposition to bring highly rich experience to customer on strong technology backbone. Marriage between infotainment and telecom networks will happen," BSNL chairman and managing director P K Purwar said at the MoU signing ceremony, Mint reported.

    All the major telecom players including Reliance Jio, Airtel, Vodafone Idea have struck deals with almost all major streaming services for betterment of average revenue per user (ARPU). Telco-OTT partnerships have been a noticeable trend not only in India but across the world as it makes a win-win deal for both the parties. Till now, OTT players in India get the largest chunk of subscription revenue from telco deals.

    Purwar said during the ceremony that content is key to drive data consumption and original content is the game of the day. He also added that the bundling proposition will be a compelling one for BSNL subscribers.

    At a time when the once telco king of India is struggling hard to run its operation, this deal marks a move by the public sector unit to retain and grow its subscriber base as the company has been making losses continuously since 2009-10. However, it will also help YuppTV to deliver its content easily to BSNL’s 120 million subscribers.

  • Top Netflix executive dismisses reports on meetings with RSS

    Top Netflix executive dismisses reports on meetings with RSS

    MUMBAI: Top Netflix executive has denied the rumoured meeting of the streaming service and representatives of the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS). Netflix India International Original film director Srishti Behl Arya termed the reports as “fake news”.

    A few days ago, media reports floated on the meetings of RSS representatives with officials of online streaming platforms such as Netflix and Amazon to restrict ‘antinational’ and ‘anti-Hindu’ content on shows and urge them to show content that “represents real Indian culture and ethos.”

    “It’s not a true story. There was no meeting at all. It’s a fake news,” Behl Arya said at a panel titled “Artistic Freedom: Mapping Out The Entertainment Story” at the ongoing Jio MAMI 21st Mumbai Film Festival Dismissing the report as “completely false,” PTI reported.

    Amazon Prime India Originals head Aparna Purohit said, "We will continue to comply with the law of the land." 

    "The law is the law. It's not like, 'I don't like you, so I'm going to stab you.' Whatever is permitted by the law, we would go into those spaces and the rest is all about the stories that creators want to tell," Behl Arya elaborated.

    Recently Reuters also reported quoting a government official that the government might impose censorship on streaming platforms which may cause censorship threats  for services like Netflix, Amazon Prime Video, Hotstar. 

  • ZEE5 plans more show franchises, to invest in direct-to-digital movies

    ZEE5 plans more show franchises, to invest in direct-to-digital movies

    MUMBAI: Zee Entertainment Enterprises Ltd’s (ZEEL) digital arm ZEE5 has built its library on the back of marquee properties and regional content since the time of its entry in the burgeoning over-the-top (OTT) ecosystem. After hitting the audience with a number of popular original shows and direct-to-digital movies, the platform is planning to bring more franchises like Rangbaaz. Moreover, while ZEE5 will continue to invest in buying movies, the platform is also planning to invest more in direct-to-digital movies.

    “Among the few things we have learnt, the first is that we want to bring more franchises. We are making follow-up seasons of some of the bigger shows like Rangbaaz and The Final Call,” ZEE5 India CEO Tarun Katial said in an interaction with Indiantelevision.com.

    “The other thing we have been able to do is an extension of existing TV show library. We did Subhan Allah into Ishq Ajkal, we did Jamai Raja into Jamai 2.0. There’s a lot more treasure in the ZEE library. Also, we have seen a very successful direct-to-digitals. While we will continue to invest in buying movies, this is a getaway to hedge cost and build own IPs. So, we are planning to invest more in direct-to-digital movies,” he added.

    Katial also noted that while the platform started the year with the commitment of creating one of the largest libraries of regional content in the country, ZEE5 consistently created content not only Hindi content but  also content in Tamil, Telugu, Bengali, Marathi, and even in Kannada.

    Katial also mentioned that among all the regional markets, the “film and original crazy” Telugu market has been doing amazingly well. As he shared, the Tamil market is also doing well after Telugu while Kannada has been a very surprising market, one of their fastest-growing markets in the regional sphere.

    While all three of these markets have regional packs, some of the users who first buy into the regional packs in Telugu and Kannada markets upgrade themselves into an all-access pack to consume some of the Hindi originals and Hindi movies. Hence, the regional packs have acted as a good entry point for consumers to sample ZEE5 and then eventually to upgrade into full subscription packages.

    ZEE5 also entered into an unusual content partnership with ALTBalaji in July to co-create original content which are available on both the platforms. Katial said that the partnership has doubled the content output every single month. He also added that it allows them to talk to different taste clusters and build certain amount of velocity behind moving, upgrading consumers from AVOD to SVOD.

    ZEE5 also broadened a lot of technology partners across the world this year. “It has been able to give us a strong collaborative recommendation engine, a consumer data platform that can engage with our consumers real-time and to be able to trigger consumption and as well as trigger updates and subscriptions that we can understand and communicate in their language, need and requirement,” he said.

    Katial also added that they noticed over a period of time that product and user journey needed to be enhanced. Hence, the platform has launched a plethora of new apps on smart TV devices with new UI, new subscription journeys enhancing its ability to onboard new users more easily. In addition to that, he noted that ZEE5 has been able to invest in data sciences this year helping them to add a fair amount of user knowledge to improve decision making, ability to create content and user experiences and more importantly to take long-term decisions on different kind of product cases.

    “The strength of market lies in two things. One is the device-ecosystem which is growing extremely well not only just on the mobile side but also on the smart-TV side. And the other is the growth of the data consumption story and video consumption is the largest part of data consumption. These are the two indicators of why Indians are going to consume more digital video and with that there will be better opportunities both on the ad-supported side as well as on the subscription side,” he commented on how the overall ecosystem has fared. 

  • OTT content comes under govt scanner

    OTT content comes under govt scanner

    MUMBAI: OTT platforms such as Netflix and Amazon Prime Video might face a censorship threat in India. Recently a senior government source told Reuters that the government might impose censorship on streaming platforms.

    The government official, who has direct knowledge of the deliberations was quoted by Reuters as saying, “The government's concern has been sparked by several court cases and complaints filed to the police in recent months, alleging that some content was obscene or insulted religious sentiment.”

    The government official also raised concern on OTT platforms not carrying the mandatory anti-tobacco textual warnings on smoking scenes in Bollywood movies.

    As per the earlier report, MIB’s secretary said that there is a need to rethink regulating OTT platform due the voice raised by certain sections of the society but the ministry does not have any plan to impose any regulation yet.

  • ZEE5 to stream ‘Bhram’ on October 24

    ZEE5 to stream ‘Bhram’ on October 24

    MUMBAI:  The OTT giant ZEE5 is coming out with a new series titled 'Bhram' which will be a one of its kind psychological thriller with an extra topping of horror. 2019 is the year that has seen Indian cinema progress to greater heights not just in mainstream cinema but even in the OTT space. ZEE5 has become a forerunner when it comes to delivering fresh and original content and there's no slowing them down.

    The genre of psychological thrillers is rarely tapped into, owing to its complexity and the extreme efforts needed to pull it off successfully. ZEE5 isn't one to back down from making daring and new content and with 'Bhram' they plan to open the doors to this genre given how it is one of the most followed themes.

    Bhram is the story of a novelist essayed by Kalki Koechlin, who is suffering from post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) and how she goes through the many eccentric emotions while pursuing a story.

    'Bhram' stars Kalki Koechlin in the lead along with Sanjay Suir, Bhumika Chawla, Eijaz Khan. The series is written by K Hari Kumar and is directed by Sangeeth Sivan.

  • Sachin, Sehwag to open for India again

    Sachin, Sehwag to open for India again

    MUMBAI: Master Blaster Sachin Tendulkar, one of the most fearsome opening batsman of all time Virender Sehwag, the legendary West Indian Brian Lara, lethal Aussie speedster Bret Lee, one of Sri Lanka’s most stylish and dependable batsman of all time Tillakaratne Dilshan and the one and only, who took fielding in cricket to a different level, Jonty Rhodes, all come together once again to enthral us with their cricketing brilliance when they lock horns for the Road Safety World Series scheduled to be held in India early next year.

    The Road Safety World Series will be an annual T20 cricket tournament between legends of five cricket playing nations—Australia, South Africa, Sri Lanka, West Indies and host India. Along with great rivalry and fierce competition, the cricketers will also spread the message of road safety during this League. The tournament will be played from 4th February to 16th February 2020, and will be hosted across premier venues in India.

    Little Master Sunil Gavaskar is the Commissioner and Master Blaster Sachin Tendulkar is the Brand Ambassador of the League. Viacom18’s Colors Cineplex is the broadcast partner while VOOT and Jio are the digital partners. The popular platform Tik Tok is coming on board as the Online Community Partner of the League.  

    The aim of the Road Safety World Series is to drive social change in the country and change people’s outlook towards road safety. As cricket is the most followed sport in the country and cricketers are looked upon as idols by many, this League will work as an ideal platform to influence and change people’s mind set towards their behaviour on the roads.

    Apart from the legendary cricketers, Melroy D’Souza, COO, Professional Management Group (PMG); Sudhanshu Vats, Group CEO & MD, Viacom18; Nitin Saluja, Director Public Policy Programs, TikTok India and Ravi Gaikwad, RTO Chief of Thane (Konkan Range) who is also a senior member of the Road Safety Cell of Maharashtra, were also present during the launch of this T20 extravaganza which has all the making of a big-ticket event in India’s sporting calendar. A portion of the profits gained during this league will go to Shant Bharat Surakshit Bharat, a charitable trust whose main objective is to promote the cause of road safety in the country.

    Mr. Gaikwad, who was a H. Sc. state topper and scientist before joining RTO said, “One things that runs very deeply in every Indians DNA is cricket. The reach of this game and the following of its stars are phenomenal and that is what we want to do, spread the message across through this game which is so close to everyone in this country. The Road Safety World Series is not just a cricket tournament but a platform to achieve a much greater goal towards humanity as a whole. It is perhaps divine intervention that has brought all of us together to create the Road Safety World Series where we will see all those legends in action whom we had started to miss in the last few years. I am sure, we all, who are here together today to make this happen, will one day be very proud of what we have achieved for ourselves and for our future generations. I know people look at sports as a form of entertainment, but if sports is played only for entertainment purpose, the Olympic movement and its glorious narrative will not have any meaning. I welcome you all to experience this unique journey where we will not only be creating memories but spearheading a movement to save more lives on Indian roads.”

    Brand Ambassador of the League, Sachin Tendulkar said, “People in India loves cricket and we are blessed to be playing the sport. The love and affection showered by one and all towards cricket and cricketers is too fulfilling to express in words. I have been regularly talking about the importance of following traffic rules and driving safely, and the platform of Road Safety World Series feels like a full circle. I am really happy to be a part of this league which not only gives the stalwarts of the cricket world a chance to come back but also an opportunity for all of us to give something back to the society through this beautiful game.”

    Speaking about the Road Safety World Series, Melroy said, “We are very excited about using cricket as a platform to promote road safety. The tournament will give an opportunity for the fans to see their idols, back in action, a chance which I think all of them will cherish. It will give some of the greatest cricketers of all time, an opportunity to pit their wits and skills against each other, all over again.”

    Speaking about the partnership for Road Safety World Series, Sudhanshu Vats, Group CEO and MD, Viacom18 said: “We have always believed that entertainment has the potential to bring about meaningful change and what better way of practising this philosophy than to bring cricketing legends in the popular T20 format to spread the message of road safety. An annual tourney spread over two weeks, I believe this league has the right balance of fandom, brevity and consumer connect to make this a viable long-term proposition – both in terms of sporting and business value. We are happy to partner with PMG and Road Safety Cell of Maharashtra Govt. to bring forth this cricketing tournament to viewers across the world.”

    Leading short view platform, TikTok has also extended its support to the campaign as Online Community Partners. As part of this partnership, the TikTok campaign #RoadSafetyChamps will launch go live on the platform in the lead up to the tournament in February 2019.

    “In line with our commitment towards the safety of our users, we are excited to partner with Road Safety World Series. As part of our ongoing safety initiatives, we’ve launched several consumer education programs in the past. Through this partnership we look forward to extending support by spreading the message of road safety through TikTok,” Nitin Saluja – Director Public Policy Programs, TikTok India.

    WHY ROAD SAFETY?

    Every year India kills a decent size European nation on its roads. In India, one person dies in every four minutes. Every hundred people dying in the world, 30 are Indians. It is more alarming that as per the World Research Institute, by 2020, the death toll in road accidents every year will reach up to 2.2 million and 50 per cent will be Indians. Every year around 1,50,000 people are killed and more than 4,50,000 people are critically injured in our country in road accidents. 

  • Netflix’s mobile-only plan in India exceeds expectations; to help invest more in content

    Netflix’s mobile-only plan in India exceeds expectations; to help invest more in content

    MUMBAI: Netflix has bounced back in its Q3 2019 financials by posting revenue of $5.245 billion, which was almost in line with analysts’ prediction of $5.25 billion and was up by 31 per cent y-o-y. While the expected earnings per share were $1.04, Netflix boosted that by delivering $1.47. This is almost double the 89 cents that it had delivered a year ago.

    While the global subscriber addition was expected to be around 7 million, Netflix came in slightly short of that giving 6.8 million additions taking its total to 158.33 million. Average streaming paid memberships and ARPU grew 22 per cent and 9 per cent year-over-year, respectively.

    In a statement to shareholders, Netflix said that the company was focused on expanding its non-English language original offerings to help penetrate international markets. The quarter saw the debut of Sacred Games S2 which Netflix said has become its most-watched show in India.

    The company also spoke about how it is making it easier for people to sign up to Netflix, including the ambitious low-priced mobile plan in India in July. It said that it was pleased with the results. “Our approach with pricing is to grow revenue and so far, uptake and retention on our mobile plan in India has been better than our initial testing suggested. This will allow us to invest more in Indian content to further satisfy our members. While still only a very small percentage of our total subscriber base, we’re continuing to test mobile-only plans in other markets,” it said.

    Netflix also admitted that while it had been competing with Amazon, YouTube and Hulu as well as linear TV for over a decade, upcoming services like Disney+, Apple TV+, HBO Max, and Peacock are also increased competition. But Netflix said, “While the new competitors have some great titles (especially catalogue titles), none have the variety, diversity and quality of new original programming that we are producing around the world. The launch of these new services will be noisy. There may be some modest headwind to our near-term growth, and we have tried to factor that into our guidance. In the long-term, though, we expect we’ll continue to grow nicely given the strength of our service and the large market opportunity.”

    It also added, “In our view, the likely outcome from the launch of these new services will be to accelerate the shift from linear TV to on demand consumption of entertainment. Just like the evolution from broadcast TV to cable, these once-in-a-generation changes are very large and open up big, new opportunities for many players.”

    Netflix said it has been preparing for this new wave of competition since 2012 when it began investing in originals and started international expansion aggressively. “We have been moving increasingly to original content both because of the anticipated pullback of second run content from some studios and because our original content is working in the form of member viewing and engagement,” it mentioned.

    “With so many firms now looking to provide premium video content to consumers, it’s a great time to be a creator of content. Amazing content can be expensive. We don’t shy away from taking bold swings if we think the business impact will also be amazing. We don’t close every deal we chase and we don’t chase every deal on the table. And while not all projects that we do pursue will work out, our large and growing subscription base helps enable us to try many approaches,” the company said.

    For Q4, Netflix is expecting consolidated revenue to increase 30 per cent year over year with 9 per cent streaming ARPU growth. It has given a forecast of 7.6 million global paid net adds with 0.6 million in the US and 7 million for the international segment.

  • Ali Hussein promoted to CEO at Eros Now

    Ali Hussein promoted to CEO at Eros Now

    MUMBAI: Ali Hussein has been elevated to the post of chief executive officer (CEO) at Eros Now, the digital arm of Eros International PLC. Hussein joined the organisation as chief operating officer in 2018.

    His experience spans over 15 years in the media entertainment and digital space. Ali has been an entrepreneur and board advisor to Discovery Networks and other startups in the media and technology domain. The media professional has updated about his recent promotion on Linkedin.

    He was associated with organisations such as Google, Viacom 18 and Hungama where he has held key positions. His expertise comes from complex mandates across mobile marketing, content syndication and distribution.

  • ZEE5 and Wework host discussion on changing landscape of the digital world

    ZEE5 and Wework host discussion on changing landscape of the digital world

    MUMBAI: Addressingthe rapidly evolving digital ecosystem in India, ZEE5 India and WeWork India today co-created an evening of discussions on the Changing Landscape of the Digital World.Tarun Katial, CEO – ZEE5 India, India’s fastest growing ConTech brand, and Ryan Bennett, CWeO of WeWork India, welcomed the guests present for the evening.Bringing forth expert voices from multiple sectors of the techno-sphere, the event was attended by content creators and enablers alike, making it an eclectic mix in the room.

    The evening comprised of two separate panel discussionscentred on Technology and Content.

    •    Themed on ‘Transforming technologies in the digital media landscape’, the Technology-focussed discussion brought Deepak Pande, Associate Director – Vodafone Idea, Vijay Kolli, Head – Mobile Strategy, Akamai Technologies and Ashish Dhawan, Managing Director – Enterprise Business, Amazon Web Services on the panel, moderated by Tushar Vohra, Head – Technology, ZEE5 India.

    •    The Content discussion that revolved around ‘OTT: The golden age of screenagers | How digital video streaming has become a lifestyle!’ brought Ekta Kapoor, Joint Managing Director, Balaji Telefilms, renowned actress Dia Mirza,and Ashvini Yardi, Bollywood Producer together moderated by Tarun Katial.

    ZEE5 and WeWork have been disruptors in their respective areas of business, and the digital ecosystem as a whole. Leveraging the synergies,the initiative aims to bring the community together to encourage industry-wide conversations around the evolution of digital world and how the players can collaborate to offer a valuable solution to the viewer.

    Tarun Katial, CEO, ZEE5 India said,“The boom in digital infrastructure in the country today has enabled the man on the street to consume content in his preferred language anytime, anywhere. For the OTT industry to remain ahead of the game always, we believe that the industry needs to come together to chart out a growth trajectory which changes keeping country’s dynamic digital landscape in mind.WeWork and ZEE5 have been disruptors in their individual capacities, and we couldn’t have chosen a better partner to set forth on this journey. With thought leaders of the calibre we saw here today, this was certainly an interesting first of many such discussions we hope to spur in the ecosystem.”

    Ryan Bennett, CWeO, WeWork India, “We are thrilled to host this interesting discussion on the changing landscape of the digital world. Such discussions help in bringing together young innovators and leverage their synergies to find solutions to relevant issues, while collaborating and developing long-lasting relationships amongst one another. Fostering this community-building spirit and encouraging industry-wide conversations is our passion as we are constantly undertaking initiatives that bring the community together.”

    Ekta Kapoor, Joint Managing Director, Balaji Telefilms, “There are three faces to every viewer – the family face, the friend's face and the face when you are alone. In my view, digital viewing is for that third face – what you watch when you are alone. Different kinds of content work for different kinds of people in different places. Television has evolved over the past 20 years; storytelling has changed. I can tell you with confidence that no medium is dying, all of them are heading towards peaceful co-existence. For every user who is going digital in urban areas, there is one person who has bought a new TV in a village. There is no one size that fits all in content. Different communities are watching different things. So hyper-personalisation is the new normal.”

    Dia Mirza, Actor, Producer, UN Environment Goodwill Ambassador & United Nations Secretary General Advocate for Sustainable Development Goals, “Social content is driving people to viewing a different kind of content – be it cinema, television or the web series. People are connecting with the stories that they see now. I believe that there is a larger purpose to story-telling and it is a powerful medium to change the way that people are thinking. Self-expression is key. The digital medium has democratised content, and this means an explosion of good content like never before bringing ample opportunity for the talented people out there who are struggling to find enough work in the industry today.”

    Ashvini Yardi, Content Producer and Founder of Viniyard Films, “I have been in the industry for the longest time and have seen the industry change in these years. Content has always been the striving force for a successful project be it on GEC channels, Cinema or digital platforms. While I was working with one of the most popular channels, I realised I wanted to explore something new and that's when OMG (the movie) happened. Moving away from something I knew and enjoyed was not easy, but films – especially OMG – was something that fascinated me, and I took the chance to explore my passion. Today I look back and feel it was a good decision. OTT is a great platform to showcase one's creativity and to choose the right channel for the content. Each channel has a different target audience and one has the freedom to create success stories, if chosen wisely. I think the industry is only going to boom with amazing work and talent.”

    Vijay Kolli, Head of Mobile Strategy, AKAMAI, “Hyper-personalisation is here to stay. Platforms are increasingly looking for the right kind of content to build viewer stickiness with the platform. We, at Akamai, carried out a survey to understand audiences’ emotional reactions to the content they were they consuming. The insights from this survey has helped us in laying out the philosophy for ad integration into OTT platforms and developing tools to gauge this effectively. As we inch towards 5G implementation, demand will rise for applications of Artificial Reality and its high interactivity component. Given Japan is moving closer to the year of hosting the Olympics, they are investing heavily into AR to elevate the entire experience; we are seeing a lot of movement there.”

    Deepak Pande, Associate Director, IoT, Vodafone Business Services, “There are two stories to hyper-personalisation – besides the obvious, there is a set of people who are worried that in case of too much personalisation, they may miss out on some spectrum of content. Convergence of technologies is happening at an unprecedented level and this will have a profound impact on the experiences that consumers are seeking. Possibility of what can be achieved through implementation of 5G is enormous, the cost is what we have to ready to bear.”

    Ashish Dhawan, Managing Director – Enterprise, Amazon Web Services, “Hyper-personalisation is complicated – applying all the tools to read and analyse the consumption trends generated by the viewerand then accessing the appropriate CX to present content to them. Difference between 4G and 5G is not just speed but the reduction in delay of response. Communication across time zones and across the ends of the planet will get lower. And with this, we will see an immediate benefit to sectors such as healthcare, education, entertainment and such.”