MUMBAI: Times Now has once again proved its mettle, emerging as the undisputed leader in Delhi Assembly elections coverage. During counting week, the channel led the English news genre with an impressive 27 per cent market share, solidifying its position as India’s go-to election news headquarters.
Times Now’s Counting Week Prime Time programming left competitors in the dust, raking in a commanding 28 per cent viewership share. Flagship shows like India Upfront and The Newshour delivered real-time insights and hard-hitting debates, making sure audiences stayed informed with accurate and credible analysis.
On Voting Day, 5 February 2025, Times Now left no room for debate, securing a dominant 31 per cent market share. With live ground reports, expert commentary, and exclusive interviews, the channel brought the election action straight to viewers, making sure no crucial moment was missed.
When it came to exit polls, Times Now remained unchallenged, locking in a 32 per cent market share. Backed by credible political insights and expert-driven analysis, the channel reinforced its status as the most trusted source for election news.
Times Now’s comprehensive lineup included Delhi Dangal: Ground Zero Survey, Public Manch, and National Debate, keeping viewers engaged at every stage of the electoral battle. Powered by seasoned journalists and a robust election roadmap, the channel delivered gripping, insightful, and data-backed coverage that outshone its competitors.
With a relentless commitment to engaging, authoritative, and in-depth journalism, Times Now once again proved why it remains India’s first choice for election coverage.
Mumbai: CNN-News18 has garnered 29 per cent market share in the in India urban plus rural AB 15+ segment, according to the data shared by Broadcast Audience Research Council (Barc).
The channel also registered a share of 37.3 per cent in the English news market as per the data (TG+22 week 15-18’22). The channel was followed by Republic TV and Times Now at 28.7 per cent and 18.5 per cent share, respectively.
“CNN-News18’s continuous run as the leader in the Barc rating is a testimony of the audience’s faith in the channel,” said the statement. “The channel’s viewership has gained viewership steadily because of the added focus on programming, along with broad-basing content to all geographies across the country.”
(Source: Barc India, Market: India, TG AB15+, Full week (0200-2600 hrs), week 15-18’22
Barc India, Market: India, TG: 22+, Monday-Friday [1800-2300 hrs], week 14-17’22 and week 15-18’22)
MUMBAI: Premium cookies, which were once seen as a product only for elite consumers, have now become accessible to everyone. As a result, the biscuits and cookies industry in India has been expanding at a compound annual growth rate (CAGR) of 10 per cent in the last three years and is currently valued at Rs 145 billion.
India is currently the world’s largest biscuit-consuming nation and the industry is expected to grow at a CAGR of 14 per cent by the end of 2019. The biscuit segment is projected to be worth approximately Rs 279 billion.
In 2015, the cookie category accounted for the largest share in the country’s biscuits market and was closely followed by plain biscuits and sandwich biscuits. The western region and metro cities are the largest markets for biscuits in India as consumers with higher disposable income don’t mind spending more on consumables such as biscuits.
In 2015 and 2016, the cookie segment, which includes brands such as Unibic, Bournvita Biscuits, Britannia Good Day and Parle Platina, witnessed a rising number of urban consumers and working population that helped in boosting the sale for the segment.
According to a research conducted by 6Wresearch, the India biscuit market stood at $3.9 billion in 2016, and is projected to grow to $8.2 billion by 2023. In terms of centre-filled biscuits, the segment is majorly dominated by the urban population. Further, non-premium biscuits accounted for majority of the revenue share in 2016. Nevertheless, premium biscuits are gaining huge acceptance in tier-I and II cities.
Bengaluru-based premium cookie maker Unibic Foods has become a recent favourite for most urban consumers that are looking for a premium cookie and what has worked for the brand, is the power of word of mouth. With a strong presence in the southern market, Unibic is actively working towards making a strong foothold in the northern belt.
The biscuits market today is 80 per cent organised with localised players dominating the regional markets. Unibic Foods head of marketing Aarti Iyer says, “The northern market is a heavy cookie consumption market and we see huge potential there. Although there are local players who are pretty strong in those markets, our focus will be to make sure all our variants are available in the North and not just selective products.”
Unibic had actor singer Shruti Hassan as its brand ambassador for over a year but eventually decided to end the contact and now has a mascot, called UBU. Although the company used Hassan for most of the advertising in southern market, she was limited to only few ads up in the North. Now with an increased focus on marketing and advertising, Unibic is looking at strengthening its position in North India while not overlooking its primary south market.
East and North India have the highest consumption of biscuits and cookies in the country. Iyer also mentioned that Unibic is looking at investing in Northeast India where they will be pushing in some strategy and plans to tap into the market.
The cookies and biscuits market is worth Rs 6000 to 6500 crore today. The top four players in the market for biscuits and cookies today are Parle Products, Britannia, ITC and Surya Foods and Agro, where both Britannia and Parle account for 61 per cent share of the market. But Unibic is gradually stepping into the race by introducing its large variety of cookies for the Indian consumer. The company’s turnover stood at Rs 60 crore by 2010 and has been growing at a CAGR of 50 per cent. In 2017, Unibic added its fifth manufacturing facility with an investment of Rs 12 crore, which will take its capacity to 100 tonnes a day.
Rather than following the conventional ‘one for all’ marketing strategy, Unibic plays to its strength in each market along with the market conditions and consumption patterns. Iyer adds, “Our marketing varies region to region. On one hand, for a cosmopolitan city like Bangalore, it is a blend of TV, outdoor and digital because the consumption of media here is very different from other smaller areas. On the other hand, Tamil Nadu has a high consumption of TV content so it makes more sense to invest in it there rather than on digital and OOH. Similarly, in the Northeast, the local channels are big and so we invest there.”
The cookie brand relies heavily on television for its advertising follows by digital and OOH. Iyer says, “TV still holds the biggest chunk of our advertising and will remain our core focus, but digital is something that we are going to go a little stronger now, not just in terms of social media to create brand affinity but also in term of digital space as such.” In the South, Unibic advertises on GEC, youth and music channels. Although it hasn’t advertised as such in the North, it wants to focus on kids channel, lifestyle and GEC channels to target the urban north market.
Unibic does not undertake any print campaigns and wants to stay away from the medium.
Healthy snacking category is a very niche territory in India and though people are conscious about what they want to eat, it’s only a small majority that focuses on eating right all the time throughout the day. The company launched snack bars in 2017 in key metros and mini metros across India which has helped the brand in targeting the desired target audience and profile for the product.
According to the company, Delhi, Bangalore, Cochin and Chennai have been its major markets for snack bars. Unibic doesn’t want to restrict itself to the health segment but is rather looking at it as a healthier snacking option, a category which is predominantly ruled by localised products with higher calories. Iyer makes it clear that they don’t want to promote the snack bars as something which is for health-conscious people but more so as a snacking option for every Indian. Additionally, a healthy snack could possibly be in the pipeline for Unibic.
The company exports to 10 counties including US, UK, Australia, Singapore, Europe, Nepal and Bhutan. The products have been well received in Nepal and Bhutan but the other markets are still underserved.
Although glucose biscuits account for about 25 per cent share in the industry, premium biscuits and cookies are moving up the consumption ladder rapidly. Compared to other FMCG products, the penetration of biscuits and cookies is pretty high, with urban area accounting to 94 per cent whereas it stands at 83 per cent in rural areas. Unibic has midrange and basic butter and milk cookies that start as low as Rs 10, but its core focus will be on premium cookies.
While the company has a good portfolio of products and the consumers today have an affinity to premium cookies, Unibic still has a long way to go before it can beat the ITCs and Britannias of the world to capture a substantial chunk of the market.
NEW DELHI: DataWind Inc has shipped more tablets in India during the fourth quarter of 2015 than any of its competitors, according to a recent IDC report.
DataWind was responsible for 20.7% of the tablets sold in India during the quarter, followed by Samsung at 15.8%, Micromax at 15.5%, Lenovo at 13.8%, and iBall at 10.0%.DataWind tablet sales have far exceeded the growth rate of the overall market in India, which according to IDC was 8.2% in 2015.
According to another recent study, DataWind holds 58% market share in the sub-Rs 5,000 tablet segment (approximately $75) which is the largest growing segment of the overall market, having nearly doubled since 2014.
DataWind is the only tablet provider in India focused on providing affordable tablets and Internet access. All DataWind tablets and smartphones come bundled with one year of unlimited Internet access, and feature the most affordable ongoing plans available on the market due tothe company’s unique, patented technology that reduces up to 97% the amount of data needed for web browsing.
Datawind President and CEO Suneet Singh Tuli said: “This IDC report reveals that more Indians prefer our tablets than any of our competitors. It also demonstrates how our transition to local manufacturing and improvements in our sales channelshas allowed us to meet the phenomenal demand.”
“Despite these strong numbers, there remains a very large portion of the population in India, like in other developing countries, where hundreds of millions of people are unable to access the Internet due to affordability issues and the lack of network infrastructure. We believe our low-cost tablets and unique mobile Internet connectivity is the only solution on the market that overcomes these obstacles and can bring Internet access to millions of people around the world,” he added.
NEW DELHI: DataWind Inc has shipped more tablets in India during the fourth quarter of 2015 than any of its competitors, according to a recent IDC report.
DataWind was responsible for 20.7% of the tablets sold in India during the quarter, followed by Samsung at 15.8%, Micromax at 15.5%, Lenovo at 13.8%, and iBall at 10.0%.DataWind tablet sales have far exceeded the growth rate of the overall market in India, which according to IDC was 8.2% in 2015.
According to another recent study, DataWind holds 58% market share in the sub-Rs 5,000 tablet segment (approximately $75) which is the largest growing segment of the overall market, having nearly doubled since 2014.
DataWind is the only tablet provider in India focused on providing affordable tablets and Internet access. All DataWind tablets and smartphones come bundled with one year of unlimited Internet access, and feature the most affordable ongoing plans available on the market due tothe company’s unique, patented technology that reduces up to 97% the amount of data needed for web browsing.
Datawind President and CEO Suneet Singh Tuli said: “This IDC report reveals that more Indians prefer our tablets than any of our competitors. It also demonstrates how our transition to local manufacturing and improvements in our sales channelshas allowed us to meet the phenomenal demand.”
“Despite these strong numbers, there remains a very large portion of the population in India, like in other developing countries, where hundreds of millions of people are unable to access the Internet due to affordability issues and the lack of network infrastructure. We believe our low-cost tablets and unique mobile Internet connectivity is the only solution on the market that overcomes these obstacles and can bring Internet access to millions of people around the world,” he added.
MUMBAI: Star World continues to dominate the English GEC category and the Star English Network (SW, FX and Fox Crime) has 48% market share in latest 4 weeks where the Star channels are blazing all guns on the ratings front. 9 out of the top 10 shows of the current week belong to Star Network. Masterchef Australia S5 continues to be the No 1 show followed by Fringe on FX , Koffee with Karan S4, X Files and Two and A Half Men.
The popular talk show ‘Koffee with Karan’ enters its 4th season, with first episode featured the evasive Salman Khan who is not a regular celebrity on any talk show. With 3 successful seasons already underway, the fourth season began with a bang as its launch week delivered 222 TVT’s and its original airing dominated with 78% share of English GEC on the Sunday 9PM slot. The show accumulated 6,19,000 viewers across its airings during the week of launch.
With its dynamic content and exclusive guest line-up Koffee with Karan also delivered big impact on the digital space and garnered huge popularity with the print and electronic media. On You Tube alone the launch episode with Salman Khan has delivered over 1.7 million views in a span of 1 week. On twitter the show conversations were at another level. Over11M+ accounts were reached as a pre-show launch build up with over 75000 tweets received delivering 80 million impressions thereby driving high-engaging conversation around the show launch. The opening episode also saw Koffee with Karan trend on twitter for approx. 24 hours and trended in the no.1 position on Facebook.
It does not stop here. The Electronic and Print media have also taken well to the show. KWK S4 has received over 150 stories amongst the mainstream papers and over 50 TV networks have covered stories of the show launch across the country ensuring that Koffee becomes the flavor of the season.
Speaking on the staggering success of the fourth season Kevin Vaz, General Manager – English channels, Star India said, “Koffee with Karan has taken the silver screen by storm with an impressive rating and the faithful viewership it continues to receive. We have always looked at airing the best quality content and entertainment, allowing Star World to surge ahead in the English GEC universe. Having seen the success in the week of launch, the future looks bright for Koffee with Karan.”
The show has already seen a number of high profile celebrities grace its sets this season including Salman Khan, Kapoor cousins Ranbir and Kareena. The coming Sunday’s episode marks a first again as it will showcase the ever-elusive Aamir Khan with wife, Kiran Rao taking the couch opposite celebrity-director and host, Karan Johar.
So stay tuned to Star English network of channels and continue to enjoy the steamy cups of Koffee this winter only on Star World.
