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Tag: Rajat Kakar

  • Sony Music appoints Mairu Gupta as head of digital business in India

    Sony Music appoints Mairu Gupta as head of digital business in India

    KOLKATA: Sony Music India has announced the appointment of Mairu Gupta as digital business director. Gupta will lead the company’s digital business with its streaming partners in India and will collaborate with Sony Music’s global teams to drive and enhance digital revenue and market share.

    Gupta brings more than 15 years of business experience and thought leadership to Sony Music India and has won multiple awards for developing breakthrough digital content throughout his career. His most recent stint was at the NBA, where he led the content and media distribution business for the League for more than 3.5 years. He bolstered the NBA's considerable digital footprint through an expansive strategy that involved growing and engaging fan bases through localised and original content such as the musically-led, award-winning NBA Hoop nation series.  

    “We are excited to have Mairu join us as we grow our strategic partnerships in the digital business,” Sony Music India managing director Rajat Kakar said. “Mairu comes with proven leadership and entrepreneurial experience that will play a key role in building new partnerships that provide new opportunities to expand the reach of our artists.”  

    Prior to the NBA, Gupta served as Vice President and Business Head of Jack in the Box Worldwide for nearly two years. In addition to setting up and leading the organisation’s New Delhi office, Gupta created strategies that significantly grew their digital communications consultancy business, winning multiple awards for excellence in digital content.

    “There is significant opportunity for Sony Music to lead the digital future of the Indian music industry, especially when considering the added benefits of being part of the wider Sony family,” added Gupta. “It’s great to be joining such an innovative company and I look forward to working with the team and our partners to build even more creative opportunities for our artists.”

    Gupta is the latest hire as part of Sony Music India’s strategy to grow its market share across the various repertoires and genres of the Indian music industry. In June, Sony Music India announced the appointment of Jagjit Singh Bhogal as Head of A&R to grow the Company’s existing artist portfolio across languages, with a special focus on garnering worldwide exposure for Indian artists.

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  • T-Series Chooses PPL As Its Exclusive Partner!

    T-Series Chooses PPL As Its Exclusive Partner!

    MUMBAI: Super Cassettes Industries India Pvt Ltd (T-Series), the leading Indian record label once again chose Phonographic Performance Limited (PPL) to manage its public performance license in India. This is an exclusive arrangement with PPL. All Bollywood party anthems be it “BomDiggy” or “Abhitho party shuruhuihai” will be part of the PPL licensing bouquet.  With T-series on board, PPL controls the lion’s share of the Indian music market , as they already have major Indian players like Saregama, Sony Music, Universal Music, Venus, Aditya, Lahari Music etc. PPL exclusively represent all international Majors in the Country thereby offering a complete bouquet of International, New Hindi Film, Old Hindi Classics and Regional Hits to its License Holders.  

    Public performance license is taken by hotels, clubs, retail stores, for events  and background music usage so as to play their choice of music at the venue or event. Payment of such usage by obtaining a license from PPL is enshrined in the Copyright law. The tariffs for various usages are published on their site.

    Mr.Bhushan Kumar, Chairman and Managing Director, T-Series said, “We have had a long association with PPL and are further very happy with the positive changes taking place under the new management. I am honoured to be able to add value to the running of the Company by coming on the Board at this juncture when the Organisation is poised to harness its true potential in the coming years”

    Speaking about the tie-up Mr. Rajat Kakar, Managing Director, PPL said, “We are delighted to renew our association with T Series for Public Performance Licensing in the Country.  With its aggressive marketing, T Series is a powerhouse of Hits and no party is a success without playing hits from their roster. As we increase our licensing footprint, renewal of this mandate was eagerly awaited by our teams and licensees alike. This year also marks a decade of our partnership with T-Series. We also welcome Mr.Bhushan Kumar, MD of T-Series on the PPL board of directors. With him on board, we look forward to PPL scaling further heights in the years to come”

  • Sony DADC elevates Rajat Kakar as managing director – India ops

    Sony DADC elevates Rajat Kakar as managing director – India ops

    MUMBAI: After successfully launching Home Entertainment Services by Sony DADC in India, Rajat Kakar has been elevated as the managing director of Sony DADC India, reporting in to Sony DADC International president Dietmar Tanzer.

     

    Kakar replaces CK Sunny, who joined the company in 1997 at a time when the audio cassette business was the prevailing format and had steered the manufacturing unit through the advent of compact discs and eventually into Blu-ray disc.

     

    In his new role, Kakar will oversee the Sony DADC manufacturing and distribution unit operations in addition to the licensee business. Core to his new responsibilities, Kakar will provide strategic guidance to the company’s existing portfolio and expand the current verticals while exploring growth opportunities for the company in India.

     

    Kakar joined the company in 2012 as the business head for its licensee business. Under his leadership, the home entertainment business portfolio expanded in a very short span of time, making it the biggest entertainment licensing and distribution entity in India. Under his guidance Home Entertainment Services by Sony DADC entered into exclusive home video marketing and distribution for major Hollywood studios like Sony Pictures Home Entertainment, Warner Home Video, Walt Disney Studios Home Entertainment and National Geographic in India.

     

    He also expanded the music portfolio encompassing Sony Music, Warner Music, Zee Music, Times Music and Saregama content in the music vertical for exploitation across all physical formats.

     

    “I look forward to this new opportunity. We are a company that provides end-to-end solution for any entertainment media company and we hope to consolidate this further with the hallmark Sony service and geographical footprint that we offer – both to our current and potential partners,” he said.

     

  • Sony DADC acquires home video license of Warner Home Video

    Sony DADC acquires home video license of Warner Home Video

    MUMBAI: Home Entertainment Services by Sony DADC has acquired the exclusive home video license of Warner Home Video for India aimed at marketing and distributing their content on all physical formats in the country.

    The venture, that is expected to become a market leader in the retailing of home entertainment products in the country, plans to bring an innovative and path-breaking approach to the marketing and distribution of the same.

    Commenting on the association of Sony DADC with Warner Home Video, Rajat Kakar, Business Head of ‘Home Entertainment Services by Sony DADC’ said, “We are extremely excited to have joined hands in partnership with Warner Home Video. This association will help us maximize our reach in the home entertainment segment. It will also add more movie titles under our repertoire and enhance our content base. We are glad to begin this alliance with Argo, the winner of this year’s Best Picture Academy Award.”

    The first title that would be released by Sony DADC under this alliance in India would be Argo that won the ‘Best Picture’ award at the recently held 85th Academy Awards. The film, directed by Academy Award winner Ben Affleck is a dramatisation of the 1980 joint CIA-Canadian secret operation to extract six American diplomatic personnel out of revolutionary Iran.

    Under this license model, close to 400 Warner Home Video titles are planned for release. They include films like The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey, Man Of Steel, 300: Rise Of An Empire, The Hangover III, The Great Gatsby and Pacific Rim.

    In addition to the fantastic array of movies lined up for the exciting year of 2013, Warner Home Video has some amazing movie titles under their repertoire, which includes classics like Ben-Hur, Gone With The Wind, Casablanca, 300, The Departed, the Harry Potter film series, Friends, The Big Bang Theory, Tom & Jerry series and The Lord Of The Rings franchise, which will now be distributed by Sony DADC in India.

  • Sony DADC ropes in Rajat Kakar as biz head

    Sony DADC ropes in Rajat Kakar as biz head

    MUMBAI: The home entertainment services division of Sony DADC has appointed Rajat Kakar as business head.

    Kakar will head the newest division at Sony DADC and is looking to challenge the conventional norms of the home video business.

    Kakar brings to the Sony portfolio 25 years of experience in the field of marketing and business development. He started his career in 1987 with Asian Paints and has since played significant marketing and management roles with players in the market like Procter & Gamble in diverse sales and marketing capacities in the early days of Global MNC‘s foray into India. After P&G he moved to Sony Music where he was part of the start-up team.

    Later, as the managing director at Universal Music, Kakar led the India operations for nearly a decade and was a key factor in transforming the company to embrace the challenges of the emerging environment in areas such as digital, artist management and merchandising. This was done with the endeavour to make Universal Music India a complete 360 degree media company.

    Sony DADC International EVP Chris Reiser said, "We are delighted to welcome such an experienced person as Rajat on board. With his comprehensive understanding of publisher needs and the retail landscape, he will play a major role in Sony DADC‘s move towards becoming an end to end supply chain service company."

    Kakar said, "I am more than excited to join this team and delighted to be mandated with setting up a state-of-the-art, sales, marketing and distribution entity which will maximize sales growth for the international studios as well as for local content holders."

  • Mobile forum focuses on latest technology trends

    Mobile forum focuses on latest technology trends

    MUMBAI: Tmobile2win, India`s leading VAS enabler hosted its first mobile Monday forum in Mumbai last week.

    The meet was attended by more than 60 professionals and enthusiasts from the Music, Telecom, Media and IT industry.Mobile Mondays are small, informal meets arranged city-wise and every month.

    The key note address was given by Netcore Solutions India VP mobile products and strategy Veerchand Bothra followed by mobile2win CEO Gopala Krishnan. He started off by explaining the concept of Mobile Monday(MoMo) and outlining the agenda for the evening followed by a presentation on the mobile indusry in general and the latest trends in mobile technology.

    The theme for the event was The Mobile Music Market in India- Untapped revenue streams in urban and rural India. Key speakers were- Soundbuzz GM Mandar Thakur, mobile2win country head Rajiv Hiranandani, Universal Music MD Rajat Kakar, Hutch’s Shailesh Varudkar, and ABP head Internet and telecom Saurav Sen.

    Discussions ranged from wireless technologies to Piracy in the mobile music industry, entertainment offerings and value added services etc.

    Kakar says, “Mobile Value Added Services (Vas) represents a growing format for sale and promotion of Music. Universal Music Group, as leaders in the Music business worldwide, have both,the responsibility and the desire to shape the contours of this opportunity in our endeavour to reach out to our consumers. Indian mobile landsacpe is among the largest in the World and interventions early in the product life cycles will, hopefully, ensure a viable eco-system for all players in this domain.”

    Mr Rajiv Discussions ranged from wireless technologies to Piracy in the mobile music industry, entertainment offerings and value added services etc.

    According to Mr Rajat Kakar, MD, Universal Music India Pvt Ltd, “Mobile VAS represents a growing format for sale and promotion of Music. Universal Music Group, as leaders in the Music business worldwide, have both,the responsibility and the desire to shape the contours of this opportunity in our endeavour to reach out to our consumers. Indian mobile landsacpe is among the largest in the World and interventions early in the product life cycles will, hopefully, ensure a viable eco-system for all players in this domain.”

    Mr Rajiv Hiranandani, Country Head, mobile2win, says “Year 2006 is a landmark year for the Indian Mobile industry.The userbase has touched around 13 crore which is only next to China”. He further added, “Mobile Monday is an industry event and which is driven by the community, whose suggestions and co-operation makes it all possible. The forum give us a platform to discuss concerning issues related to the mobile VAS industry in a more open and informal manner”.

    Hiranandani says, “Year 2006 is a landmark year for the Indian Mobile industry.The userbase has touched around 13 crore which is only next to China. Mobile Monday is an industry event and which is driven by the community, whose suggestions and co-operation makes it all possible. The forum give us a platform to discuss concerning issues related to the mobile Vas industry in a more open and informal manner”.