ITV

Tag: Over the Top

  • Eros to propel digital play in July with campaign; defers Pay TV strategy

    Eros to propel digital play in July with campaign; defers Pay TV strategy

    MUMBAI: Indian entertainment company Eros International Plc is betting big on digital play with its over the top (OTT) platform ErosNow. Come July and the company will unveil its exclusive movie line-up as well as original shows on the platform.

     

    In order to push its offerings on ErosNow, the company will launch a marketing campaign around its movie premieres (pre-television, post-theatrical window), as well as original shows.

     

    What’s more, Eros has deferred its plans to launch pay TV channels as was planned earlier and will instead focus on strengthening its position in the OTT arena. The company had plans to launch a Hindi movie channel and a music channel.

     

    Even as the company’s television licensing revenues continue to be strong on the back of digitization and constitutes over 35 per cent of its revenues; in the light of its new focus on its OTT space, Eros’ strategy will be to premiere films on ErosNow and then syndicate them to television channels around the world after that window closes.

     

    In FY-2015, digital and ancillary segments of the company contributed revenues of $59.9 million as compared to $47.7 million in FY-2014. The company’s other two primary revenue streams theatrical and television syndication contributed revenue of $123.1 million and $101.2 million respectively in FY-2015 as compared to $107.5 million and $80.3 million respectively in FY-2014.

     

    Eros International managing director and CEO Jyoti Deshpande said, “Our pre-launch phase of ErosNow has been very successful with 19 million registered users globally, up 35.7 per cent from the 14 million users we announced in February 2015. We believe the combination of being an early mover, our unique studio assets, and the high market share of our extensive library positions us to be the leading player in the Indian digital entertainment industry.”

     

    Eros International reported 20.7 per cent growth in revenue to $284.3 million in FY-2015 (year ended 31 March, 2015) as compared to the $235.5 million in the previous year. Currency comparable revenues increased by 22.4 per cent.

     

    For the quarter ended 31 March, 2015 (Q4-2015), the company reported 39.8 per cent (currency comparable revenues increased by 40.7 per cent) revenue growth to $88.5 million as compared to the $63.3 million in the corresponding year ago quarter.

     

    Eros reported 32.9 per cent increment in net income to $49.3 million in FY-2015 from the $37.1 million in FY-2014. Net income in Q4-2015 more than tripled (3.01 times) the $19.4 million as compared to the $6.4 million in Q4-2014.

     

    Deshpande added, “Our fourth quarter and full year results demonstrate the strength and scalability of our business, our dominant leadership position and our ability to capitalize on the growing and underpenetrated Indian media, entertainment and digital industry.”

     

    “Our growth from non-Diaspora international markets shows a growing appetite for Bollywood content in many new markets. One of our strongest potential markets, China, with a market size of $4.8 billion and over 23,600 screens, is projected to soon surpass Hollywood as the largest film market in the world. Our latest collaboration agreements with Chinese Film Corp and Shanghai Film Group to co-produce and distribute Sino-Indian films are important steps in maximizing our opportunity in China.”

     

    Eros’ television syndication revenue remained strong in fiscal year 2015, with an over 50 per cent increase quarter-on-quarter, with high and medium budget films helping Eros syndicate attractive bundles of new and library films.

     

    Eros group executive chairman Kishore Lulla said, “By creating the first studio model in India and achieving 20 times growth in the last ten years to now over $100 million in adjusted EBITDA, Eros has successfully completed its first pioneering effort in transforming the Indian film industry and becoming its global leader. Looking forward, our goal now is to pioneer yet again using the strength of our films and our exciting ErosNow platform to become the leading Indian digital entertainment company globally.”

  • HOOQ targets tier I Indian cities as early adopters; plans original series

    HOOQ targets tier I Indian cities as early adopters; plans original series

    MUMBAI: Come June and India will witness its first subscription based video-on-demand platform HOOQ.

     

    As was reported earlier by Indiantelevision.com, the platform will compete with over the top (OTT) players like Hotstar and Ditto TV amongst others. As a major differentiating factor, HOOQ will be providing content that has not been available before to Indian consumers and intends to target tier I cities in the country as early adopters. However, the app will be available to all smart phone users nationally. The service also offers content for all age groups.

     

    The OTT player is in the Indian market for the long haul. With a view to gather substantial number of users in the coming years, HOOQ is also looking at starting its own original series, a la Netflix, which had launched its exclusive made-for-web series House of Cards.

     

    In a conversation with this website about its readiness to improve the platform, HOOQ India head Krishnan Rajagopalan said, “We are constantly going to be evolving the product and the content based on user feedback. This is very much a company philosophy and it’s really up to the user to give us feedback. The better feedback you give, the better the product will be.”

     

    When queried whether the Indian audience is ready for a particular genre, which has more traction Rajagopalan said, “We are going to have different categories. The app will have all Indian languages and feeds and by the time we launch it will be more Indianised. It will be much more relevant, have genres that matter, top action, top rom-com; we will have it all.”

     

    Talking about the Indian market, Rajagopalan said that since India was a fascinating market, there are bound to be challenges. “This is a first product in its category. I don’t think there is anybody doing what we are doing, which is to offer premium content that is not there on ad supported platforms. So we are spending a lot of money, tens of millions on marketing, content and technology. A major challenge is that there will be a lot of consumer education required in the early days and we clearly need to have the right content. We need to have the right distribution partnerships to make it as convenient to the consumer as possible. Not necessarily a challenge, but there are steps that we need to take before we become ubiquitous.”

     

    While the company has not yet chalked out its marketing strategy, plans are to take ‘Go To Market’ (GTM) marketing route when the service’s commercial launch takes place in June.

     

    Speaking about Warner Bros’ association with HOOQ, Warner Bros general manager N Muthuram said, “Singtel will have a strategic presence in the Indian market with their partnership with Airtel. While we are licensed to HOOQ, we also have other local partners and we have been providing content to others as well. The deal with HOOQ is to have access to all of the content that is relevant to the consumer.”

     

    As reported earlier, the platform will have 10,000 movies and series from Hollywood, Bollywood and regional content for just Rs 199 a month. HOOQ is a joint venture with Singtel, Sony Pictures Television and Warner Bros. It will provide content from international as well as local players and has already partnered with 60 local partners.

  • “Disorganisation of analogue cable in Phase III & IV will help DTH”: Harit Nagpal

    “Disorganisation of analogue cable in Phase III & IV will help DTH”: Harit Nagpal

    MUMBAI: While India has witnessed Phase I and Phase II of digitisation, the remaining two phases (i.e Phase III and IV) will go a long way in aiding more transparency. Direct to Home (DTH) platforms too are an enthused lot, hoping it will help them gain additional subscribers. 

     

    Speaking about the expected development Tata Sky CEO Harit Nagpal said, “As digitisation rolls out, we are hopeful that a large number of consumers will move to DTH because analogue cable is little less organised in Phase III and IV of digitisation.”

     

    Nagpal said that the first two phases impacted approximately 15 per cent of the TV population. According to him, when it came to the process of conversion from analogue cable to digital, about 40 per cent of the analogue subscribers picked up DTH.  Nagpal was speaking at the Asia Pacific Operators Summit (APOS) held in Balli recently.

     

    Speaking about net additions, he said that the pace had not slowed down. “Even when we were acquiring close to 10 million subscribers as gross, we were getting three to four net additions. Today, the industry picks six to seven million gross, it still makes three to four million net.” Nagpal further added that this would be facilitated by digitisation in places where the first two phases were complete.

     

    Nagpal believes that the top four DTH players will become cash positive very soon. “It’s on the horizon now. We have already been covering our operational costs. The investment that is really going into the business is going to fund the growth,” he said.

     

    According to Nagpal, an investor wouldn’t mind finding the growth because on a 10-12 per cent churn, the life of a customer is seven to eight years. As such if the pay back is three years, then an operator has about six to seven years cash life with the customer.

     

    “Thus an investor is happy to invest and add the gross adds faster and does not mind paying for the investment,” he added.

     

    While on the one hand, Videocon d2h CEO Anil Khera expressed his displeasure over premium content being distributed for free by Over The Top (OTT) platforms, Nagpal explained his point of view. “I treat myself, i.e. a content access provider, as a grocer. We buy soaps and cereals in bulk and sell them in small packets. If three generations in a single family want to consume bread, rice and pasta we have it stocked. Secondly, if these three generations ordered the food respectively via in shop, over the phone or placed an order online, I have to cater to that and make it convenient for customers.” 

     

    He further said that he would not go about cursing people as to why content is being given out for free. “I have to make it convenient for the customer to find everything at one place,” he stressed.

     

    On the added service of video on demand (VOD), Nagpal said that four years ago when Tata Sky launched VOD, it had seen an investment of close to $10 million. Currently the operator was just breaking even on operating costs. “But we know it’s a long term play. It’s not necessarily a play of premium content. In fact, on our first VOD we made available Hindi movies and not English. The reason being English movies’ rights holders were sceptical and insisted on minimum guarantees.”

     

    On the issue of broadband bandwidth, Nagpal stated that going by the current world wide web phenomenon it was obvious that  video cannot be carried by over the air as the last mile has to be connected by at least some form of wire. He hoped a new entity would cater to this business very soon. 

     

    “Currently there are a lot of entrepreneurs who provide broadband very well in some areas. They have just been constrained by expansion. We are hoping that in a year’s time the landscape will change. Some funding will come in and then they will expand,” he concluded.