ITV

Tag: Ravi Deshmukh

  • New ‘plug-in’ movie channel Cine World set for February launch

    New ‘plug-in’ movie channel Cine World set for February launch

    MUMBAI: A wider choice of English films is what is promised when new movie channel Cine World makes its debut in the first week of February (the launch date is still being finalised).

     
    Cine World is promoted by Channel Guide India Ltd, which already runs what it says is India’s first and only FTA digital info TV channel catering to the promotional needs of the entire entertainment industry – television, films, music and events.

    Speaking on the new “plug-in” English movie channel was Channel Guide COO Ravi Deshmukh. Says Deshmukh, “We will be providing quality English films that have not been seen before by most viewers.” Cine World has sourced its movies from Australia, South Africa and Hong Kong as well as from the smaller Hollywood studio offerings, says Deshmukh. This will have kept acquisition costs low no doubt but Deshmukh assures that the films are of good quality.

    Cine World is not planning to take on the big boys of the business like HBO, Star Movies or Zee MGM but will operate as an English cable movie channel on the lines of INCableNet’s CVO or Hathway’s CCC. Additionally, Cine World will be showcasing one blockbuster Hindi film a week, says Deshmukh.

    Cine World is beaming of the Insat 3A satellite in C band and will become encrypted from Day 1 of official launch unlike its sibling Channel Guide which is an FTA channel.

    Channel Guide is currently showcasing a film a day at 11 pm so that viewers get an idea of the kind of films that will be on offer, says Deshmukh.

  • Channel Guide achieves turnaround; posts profit

    MUMBAI: Channel Guide India Ltd has posted a net profit of Rs 721,000 for the year ended 31 March 2003 as against a loss of Rs 15.28 million for the previous year.
    The listed company runs what it says is India’s first and only FTA digital info TV channel catering to the promotional needs of the entire entertainment industry – television, films, music and events.
    The company also posted an income of Rs 14.59 million for year ended 31 March 2003 as compared to Rs 12.24 million for the previous year. A press release states that the turnaround can be attributed mainly to the commencement of revenues and stringent cost controls.
    “Incidentally we are very upbeat about the opportunities than CAS will throw open to FTA channels in general and Channel Guide in particular,” says Channel guide COO ravi Deshmukh.
    The company has drawn up an ambitious plan that is proposed to be implemented in three phases:
    Phase I – TV Info Channel (already on air)
    Phase II – Info TV Channel.
    Phase III – Interactive TV with t-commerce applications such as teleshopping, Video on Demand (VOD).
    The company currently operates a 16 hours a day ( IST 9am to 1am) TV Channel providing a unique promotion platform for India-specific promotion of TV channels and content, films (both Hindi and English) intended for theatre release, music and events (both ground and televised). The statement says that the thrust is to ensure that the presentation is customised to meet the promotional needs of the broad spectrum of content providers on one hand and the information needs of the viewers on the other hand. The programmes and channels are classified as per language and genre at the primary level and time band at the secondary level.
    The company has recently launched first ever satellite video delivery linked cable marketing services.

  • Channel Guide in the red in 2001-2002 fiscal

    Channel Guide in the red in 2001-2002 fiscal

    Channel Guide has incurred losses worth Rs 15.28 million for the year ended 31 March 2002.

    According to the financial results released by the company, its “income from operations” has decreased from Rs 12.8 million to Rs 11.5 million over last year’s figures thereby showing a drop of about 10 per cent. This, according to Channel Guide COO Ravi Deshmukh, is due to the stoppage of various leasing activities that were undertaken by the organisation in the past. At present, the company says it is concentrating solely on the recovery of outstanding dues.

    The total expenditure of the company has risen by a whopping 300 per cent from Rs 8.77 million to Rs 23.94 million. This has been mainly attributed to the fact that last year’s balance sheet figures indicated business activities that were mainly non-media activities while the present balance sheet contains media activities.

    Company sources attribute the drop of 30 per cent in the amount of depreciation from Rs 5.2 million to Rs 3 million to the same factor i.e. change in the mode of business. However, it is being reported that there has been no further leasing or no new purchase or sale of assets in the current year.

    The company however hopes to reach break-even by the third quarter of the current fiscal. 

  • Channel Guide to allot equity shares on preferential basis

    Channel Guide India Ltd informed the Bombay Stock Exchange today that the company board has decided to issue 2 million equity shares of Rs10 each at par to promoter/director/relatives/associates and selected person on preferential basis.

    The board will call a shareholders meeting to obtain approval in due course, a company release says.

    Queried as to the reasoning behind the move, Ravi Deshmukh, chief operating officer, Channel Guide said the it was to fund the company’s expansion plans.

    Channel Guide is a specific preview and menu free-to-air channel that primarily relays infomercials about the various satellite channels that exist today. The channel also acts as a promotional platform for the new film and music releases and highlights major cultural events and certain premium brands.

  • Channel Guide to allot equity shares on preferential basis

    Channel Guide to allot equity shares on preferential basis

    Channel Guide India Ltd informed the Bombay Stock Exchange today that the company board has decided to issue 2 million equity shares of Rs10 each at par to promoter/director/relatives/associates and selected person on preferential basis. 

    The board will call a shareholders meeting to obtain approval in due course, a company release says.

    Queried as to the reasoning behind the move, Ravi Deshmukh, chief operating officer, Channel Guide said the it was to fund the company’s expansion plans.

    Channel Guide is a specific preview and menu free-to-air channel that primarily relays infomercials about the various satellite channels that exist today. The channel also acts as a promotional platform for the new film and music releases and highlights major cultural events and certain premium brands.

  • Channel Guide expects cable ads to bring in revenues

    Channel Guide expects cable ads to bring in revenues

    Six-month-old infotainment channel Channel Guide is all set to enter a new field of ‘Satellite Video Delivery Service’. Elaborating on the concept, Ravi Deshmukh, COO, Channel Guide Network India Ltd says: “There is a growing demand from advertisers for a cheaper way of reaching local cable operators. There are close to 10,000 cable operators in India. The cost involved in reaching out and delivering hard copy to all of them is huge and beyond the capacity of small and medium scale advertisers.

     

    Channel Guide plans to make use of its satellite service during the night hours (as the channel is off air from 11 pm to nine am) to telecast the advertisements. Cable operators can record advertisements and telecast them on their network on agreed upon terms. “We have agreements with almost all the cable operators and will have one monitoring agent for every 100 cable operators who will monitor their performance.”

     

    The advertiser will decide the area he wants to cover and accordingly inform Channel Guide. The advertisements to be telecast will be given to the channel. The area monitoring agent will in turn inform the respective cable operators, who will then record the signals and show it on the network at the specified time.

     

    Advertising rates are fixed depending on the number of connections and the area for each cable operator, giving advertisers the option to opt for the optimum mix of advertising budget and target customer. The revenues will first go to the channel which will pay the cable operators through the agents.

     

    “They (advertisers) can even change the advertisement seven days before telecast, a provision not possible in other advertising options. In fact, we are studying a proposal to start uplinking from India, which will reduce the seven-day minimum to one day. This is likely to be through by January next,” says Deshmukh.

     

    Commenting on Channel Guide’s position, he says: “We have reached five million C & S homes. A paid advertisement service called ‘Channel Guide Exclusive’ will start this month,” he said, but refused to divulge the name of the channels that have agreed to advertise on Channel Guide. Apart from the broadcasters, film and music companies are expected to use the channel as an advertising medium.

     

    Regional language programming, slotted in the 8-9 am band, will also start from this month, says Deshmukh.

     

    The company is also looking at content syndication for programming and giving it to small regional print publications. “We receive programming data for almost all channels, while small publications die to get the data. We can provide them the same,” he says.

  • Channel Guide makes formal launch

    Channel Guide makes formal launch

    Channel Guide, which started beaming its test signals four months ago, was formally launched earlier this week at the Club in the northern Mumbai suburb of Andheri.

    Channel Guide India managing director Rajesh Jain says that loads of research has gone into the channel before its launch.

    ‘We are spending more on state-of-art technology and distribution, but the programming cost is almost nil for us. All the data is provided by the advertising channels themselves. I feel this will help us to break even in fourteen months,’ says a visibly relaxed and confident Jain.

     

    The television channel is an innovation for the Indian market as it is hoping to serve as a promotional platform for the entire entertainment industry – namely, television, films, music and events.

    ‘It also provides programming info to viewers in a simple format. Any person will get to know maximum within six minutes what is going on on any of the channels,’ he points out.

     

    At present, Channel Guide is not charging advertisers and partners for placing their promos. Channel Guide COO Ravi Deshmukh says that advertisers will be provided prime and non-prime time slots with rates for the former being on a par with the prevailing commercial market rates.

    ‘We will start charging from mid-October when our channel will be reaching 3 million homes,’ says Deshmukh. As of now the reach, is 2.1 million.

    Deshmukh reveals that that three channels have already confirmed their partnership status with Channel Guide.

     

    From 1:00 pm to 7:00 pm, time slots will be sold to advertisers – be they channels or event creators or producers – for shows/events that each of them wants to promote. The rest of the time will be allocated to promos of various channels in a format designed by Channel Guide programming executives themselves.

     

    Each screen can have a maximum of 16 small windows, showing what is going on 16 channels at any point of time along with a live programming schedule which will change every few minutes. The management is planning to reduce the number of channels visible to four at a time.

    Programming blocks in Hindi and English have been set aside. “In the near future we are going to dedicate separate time slots for regional languages,” says Deshmukh. “Marathi, Gujarathi, Bengali and Punjabi are the four languages on the cards.”

    One of the shows that Deshmukh is extremely kicked about is Meet the Telebrity featuring a popular TV personality. The first episode features Amar (Mihir) Upadhayay.

     

    Channel Guide is beaming off Thaicom-3 as a free-to-air service. The channel is looking forward to getting an Indian uplinking from either Delhi or Hyderabad.

    Technical Specifications:
    Satellite : Thaicom – 3
    Downlink Frequency : 3554 MHz
    FEC : 2/3
    Downlink Polarisation : Vertical
    Symbol rate : 13333 Kg Symbol/sec
    Free-To-Air

  • Channel Guide sets August deadline for formal launch

    Channel Guide sets August deadline for formal launch

    It’s hoping to act as a guide in the maze that is Indian cable & satellite television today. Channel Guide a specific preview and menu channel which began its test run on 12 April 2001 may go for a formal launch tentatively on 15 August 2001, “We are in talks with major companies, the outcome of which will decide its formal launch,” informs Ravi Deshmukh chief operating officer, Channel Guide India Ltd.

    The channel is programmed to provide couch potatoes with a ready reckoner on TV shows. Its interactive menu allows viewers to explore, select and watch a variety of programmes, while browsing listings. “Channel Guide airs the programme listings of different channels between 9 am and 11:00 pm, reminding viewers about their favourite programme timings,” says Deshmukh.

    Currently the free to air channel has a million strong viewership, and receives inputs from 27 major channel among which are Star, Zee, Sony, HBO, ESPN, he reveals. The channel is available in nine states nationally: Maharashtra, Gujarat, Karnataka, Rajasthan, Madhya Pradesh, Andra Pradesh, Delhi, Goa and Assam.

    “So far we have received a good response, and we will do better after the channels which have been reluctant in providing us with information drop their inhibitions,” emphasizes Deshmukh. “But the response is improving. English, Hindi entertainment and infotainment channels like Discovery and National Geographic, and other sports channels are already supporting us. Next month Bengali and Punjabi channels will join our bandwagon and the rest of the regional languages will soon be added.”

    Currently, the channel is carrying TV promos and listings gratis for its broadcasting partners. In time to come, it plans to start charging for its air time wherein channels like Sony or Zee or Star would be in a position to sponsor their own promo and interstitial programming blocks. Five of the 10 hours the channel will air will be free to air. Of the remainder, three will be set aside for broadcaster-sponsored promos, while local commercial advertising will go to account for the remainder two hours.

    With an initial investment of Rs 100 million (10 crore), the channel has also plans to foray into to webcasting and cater to web savvy viewers and international audiences interested in Indian television fare.

    “We have a long term vision for Channel Guide India. We cannot really commit when we will really break even, but our target has been set as June 2002,” points out Deshmukh.

  • New channel Channel Guide launching mid-May

    New channel Channel Guide launching mid-May

    There’s a new channel on the block that has been beaming as a test signal since 2 April and its called Channel Guide.

    Channel Guide officially launches on 15 or 16 May with the aim of being the “channel junction” for the television viewer, says the company’s COO Ravi Deshmukh. It will be a free to air digital channel beaming off Thaicom-3.

    The channel hopes to cover television, films, theatre, music and events with a very localised perspective. It will have genre-wise (also language-wise) anchored slots incorporating footage as well as interesting commentary about featured programmes.

    Deshmukh appears undaunted about launching a channel at a time when the industry as a whole is facing a cash crunch with broadcasters cutting back on their projects rather than attempting new ventures.

    Deshmukh says his channel provides a valuable service to the industry as a whole and expects both broadcasters and cable operators to support the channel. He aims to take his channel to 60 towns and cities across the country within the next four months.