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Tag: Ravish Kumar

  • Colors Marathi to explore kids animation, crime and game show genres in 2020

    Colors Marathi to explore kids animation, crime and game show genres in 2020

    MUMBAI: The regional arm of Viacom18 contributes to 25 per cent of company's growth. It is no wonder then that one of its leading regional channels, Colors Marathi, has increased its market share from 20 per cent in 2018 to 30 per cent in February 2020, according to the channel. This year it aims to expand its programming hours by exploring genres like kids animation, crime and non-fiction format in games.

    Viacom18 regional entertainment head Ravish Kumar says, "In 2020, we will be expanding our hours of programming with more shows. We would like to get into genres which have not been tried in this market like kids animation, crime and within non-fiction we are already doing home-grown formats and international formats but we are also trying to consider formats which are new to the market. Game shows have been explored here but we are trying to do a game show which is different."

    He says, "We have very limited hours of programming; the channel has 15 hours of programming in a week, which is less than what Zee Marathi is offering. It is significantly lower than Star Parvah. We are running our primetime originals only from 7 pm to 9.30 pm. Despite having only five original shows three of our programmes are in the top five shows."

    Currently, the channel has three tentpole shows – Balu Mama, Jeev Zala Yeda Pisa and Raja Rani Chi Ga Jodi. He Man Baware, a romantic love story and Swamini, a historical story are the two other shows.

    "Our goal is to try and come up with something meaningful for that market. Our content has to be family-friendly, deeply engaging and it has resonated with the viewers. Typically we pick up shows which hit this entire bracket. They have to be relatable and rooted. Our struggle is always for good stories; there are outstanding stories out there but that might not be right for us," he opines. 

    Kumar also tells that the regional space contributes around 25 per cent and he wants the space to contribute 50 per cent to the company in future. Kannada, Marathi and Tamil are priority markets for Viacom18.

    He further says that advertisers are responding positively to this market because Marathi is growing in importance. "Marathi as a genre has grown much stronger and the quality of programming is amazing. We do Bigg Boss and we were the first in the country to ever take it regional. We started with Kannada, went to Bangla and now we are in Marathi as well. So, there is a lot of interest from advertisers."

    The total TV viewership in Maharashtra has come down slightly since 2018. In 2018 it was 4,475 GRPs which has now come down to 4,000 GRPs. Within that the share of Marathi language GRPs has gone up from 23 per cent to 30 per cent.

    The market witnessed many new entrants like Zee Yuva, Sony Marathi, Fakt Marathi and Shemaroo Marathi movie channel. "Between that and with the quality of content, viewership of Marathi is going up. Even if we look at the top five channels in the market, earlier it would always be Zee Marathi followed by a bunch of Hindi channels; now four out of the five top channels are Marathi channels. The share of Marathi viewership has gone up and the position of Marathi channels has improved slightly. With better content and more channels it is but natural that the share of Marathi will rise," he says. 

    Maharashtra has a rich history of folk and literature. Kumar says that the thrust for good content and nuanced storywriting is much higher in this market; it's less on drama and more on content. So, it's not special effects or high production value which can carry the shows but rather intelligent scripting. "It’s a great system of movie makers, writers, theatre and fabulous stories that have never been told," he concludes.

  • COLORS Tamil celebrates two years

    COLORS Tamil celebrates two years

    CHENNAI: COLORS Tamil, Viacom18’s first Tamil GEC, has celebrated two years of entertaining Tamil Nadu. 

    Known for its marquee shows such as Kodeeswari, a first-of its kind all-women version of Kaun Banega Crorepati, reality shows Kalla Petti and Singing Stars, and popular fiction shows like Thirumanamand Uyire, COLORS Tamil continues to entertain and engage with its viewers in exciting and unique ways.

    COLORS Tamil was launched on February 19, 2018 with the brand philosophy, ‘Idhu Namma Oru Coloru’ meaning ‘The COLORS of our land’. After a successful entry into the market, it further expanded to Singapore, Malaysia and the US. 

    On celebrating two years of COLORS Tamil, Ravish Kumar, Head – Regional Entertainment Cluster, Viacom18, said: “COLORS Tamil was launched with an aim of delivering new and never-seen-before content to homes in Tamil Nadu. It has always been our endeavour to present content that is innovative and reflective of our audience. We have witnessed tremendous growth and loyalty towards the channel over the last 2 years and are grateful that our viewers have placed their trust in us. Close to 50% of our viewers are under 40 years of age and watch our content everyday. We are extremely excited about completing yet another milestone in our journey in the Tamil market.We will continue to build on our brand philosophy of IdhuNammaOruColoru while we entertain our viewers with content that is truly disruptive and that is able to create a difference.”

    Anup Chandrasekharan, Business Head, COLORS Tamil,  added: “COLORS Tamil has successfully cemented its relationship with viewers owing to the channel’s thought provoking and socially conscious content. Over the last 2 years, we have launched shows that have had a lasting impact on our audience. Moreover, our viewers resonate with the brand values and philosophy we launched with. Kodeeswari alone was sampled by 4.5 crore Tamil Nadu viewers within six weeks. We will continue to innovate and introduce content that is innovative, differentiated and true to our ethos.”

    The channel thoroughly studies consumer patterns on an ongoing basis and curates its differentiated content. Its strength lies in consistently providing thought provoking, socially relevant and relatable content to its viewers. Over the past 2 years, the channel has entertained its audiences with various titles in genres like Family, Drama, Comedy and Fantasy. It has created a mark for itself, standing out with its varied offerings such as EngaVeetuMapillai, Thari, Malar and many more. It has launched some big-ticket, non-fiction properties like Dance Vs Dance, Singing Stars and Kodeeswari. The shows have attained popularity among the audience due to the distinct content and their outstanding quality that is on par with the standards of National Television. To further strengthen its footprint, the channel is all set to expand its original hours of content with new shows. This February, the channelintroduced two captivating fiction shows, IdaiyathaiThirudadhey which is a love story  with a twist and Naagini 4, the Tamil dubbed version of the popular Hindi supernatural fantasy show.

    With an interesting mix of fiction and non-fiction shows, COLORS Tamil will continue to strengthen its content offering thus catering to a wide variety of audiences. 

  • ‘Kodeeswari’ doubled primetime slot viewership: Viacom18’s Ravish Kumar

    ‘Kodeeswari’ doubled primetime slot viewership: Viacom18’s Ravish Kumar

    MUMBAI: The Tamil adaptation of Kaun Banega Crorepati saw an interesting tweak – all the participants and the host are women. Launched on 23 December 2019, Kodeeswari brought out and continues to bring heart-wrenching stories of women contestant and aims to encourage and motivate them to fulfil their dreams.

    The channel says that its focus was on education and enlightenment rather than making money in this instance. Apart from grabbing eyeballs, the show also succeeded in strengthening the channel's relation with brands not on the facts of ratings but on the concept of spreading the message and inspiring viewers.

    Viacom 18 regional entertainment cluster head Ravish Kumar, in an interaction with Indiantelevision.com, explained the thought behind the tweaked concept of Kodeeswari, association with brands, viewership growth, marketing strategy, show’s performance on digital platform, and Colors Tamil’s roadmap in 2020.

    Edited excepts:

    What was the thought behind coming up with the all-women season of Koodeswari?

    Women give up their dreams for their loved ones, family or children and they live their dreams through them. We wanted to do a show as a tribute to women’s unconditional love and selfless sacrifices that they make every day. We didn’t want to come up with a quiz show with a celebrity host and Rs 1 crore as prize money. We wanted to do a show that would make some difference, inspires, motivates and creates a movement. We wanted to give the opportunity to the dreams that have been buried all these years. ‘Heart that beats for others should not skip a beat for itself’ that was our guiding principle behind the show that’s why we made it an all-women show. Despite Kodeeswari being all-women show, it is the family that has supported them to make their dreams come true. With the line ‘Choti si Asha’ we wanted to understand where did that go and why and we want to bring it back in women’s lives with the show.

    What is the marketing strategy for the show? How are you ensuring the reach of the show in remote areas to give more powers to women?

    It’s a function of where we do the audition and how do you get the word out. We were extensive in our audition and tried to cover every district in Tamil Nadu. Next time we will go even deeper. Every single person who has been on the show has a fabulous story. There was a contestant name Sushmita who was partially blind and I am happy to share that she is cured now. There are other people who have overcome the difficulties at multiple levels. Each story in many ways is very inspirational, turns society on its head and makes a positive difference to them; it’s an encouragement to others.

    With this format are you specifically trying to reach out to female audiences?

    The target audience is the family, we put it in the primetime slot from 8 to 9.30 pm and the viewership is across the board, it’s not just men or women, people are watching it together and the show is all about that.

    How is the show helping brands and advertisers?

    We have been very lucky to get a lot of sponsors even before the show began. The relation with brands got stronger as they realise it’s not about the ratings but about spreading the message, creating a movement and inspiring many others. I think it’s the message that will continue even if the show has gone off air. Brands are very proud and privileged to be part of Kodeeswari and we are equally proud and privileged to partner with them. We thank them for their support; trust in our vision and for standing by us. It’s going to work well for the brands which are associated with us as well as the channel. But the bigger side of this is, the show is very positive for the society which is what television is about, it is the opportunity to educate, entertain and enlighten. With Kodeeswari we are doing all this.

    Has the show also added in the viewership or subscription numbers?

    The channel has seen a growth in the slot in which the show is aired as well as in the overall channel.  The slot viewership has doubled and channel’s ratings is up almost 20 per cent. But more intangible is the conversations that we are having about the show and the difference it continues to make. More and more people are watching and we will continue to grow until the last episode. Subscription numbers are known once in a month and we are yet to get that after the launch of the show. Definitely there might be some growth but it's too early to say anything.

    How does format like Kodeeswari help a regional channel?

    We are a new channel and it’s an investment for us and the dividend will only come down the road as we continue to do more of such shows which truly make a difference and help us connect with our viewers. We did not do this show with an intention to make money; we did it to make a difference as we hold ourselves to socially responsible programming. That is what we try to achieve with Kodeeswari and other shows on Colors Tamil.

    How is the show doing on the digital platform?

    On digital, we continue to push the show in terms of anyone coming online and visiting our site. We have play along offered on VOOT. We also do extra footage that we air on the channel which helps to capture the journey of people even after they won money and went out of the show. We do a lot of extra content and give them the opportunity to engage. We look forward to user-generated content that we can share with others. It’s working on the multiple levels and the engagement will be growing over time.  It continues to grow every single day on digital and it’s my second-most visited show on the channel and will quickly become the first.

    Did you revise the ad rates for the show?

    Ad rates were not revised for the show; we are happy to be giving an opportunity to the people to partner with us for the show.

    Will the channel be coming up with a similar format in season 2 of Kodeeswari?

    We look forward to bringing a strong season 2 as well and like I said it’s a conversation that started and we will continue to keep having conversations through this or other shows both in fiction and non-fiction and basically every touchpoint that we have with Tamil viewers and viewers across all our markets.

    What is the roadmap for Colors Tamil in 2020?

    We entered the market in 2017, we made a meaningful mark already. We want to build on the momentum, i.e., to be differentiated and carry a message more than just pure entertainment.

  • Kannada KBC to air on Colors Kannada starting 22 June

    Kannada KBC to air on Colors Kannada starting 22 June

    BENGALURU: Viacom18 has taken over where Star India left off – the Kannada version of Kaun Banega Crorepati – Kannadada Kotyadipathi or KK will start airing on Viacom18’s flagship Kannada GEC Colors Kannada and its HD counterpart Colors Kannada HD starting Saturday 22 June.

    It’s a strategic move as far as Viacom18’s Kannada entertainment cluster head Parameshwar Bhat is concerned – Colors Kannada has a strong lineup of programmes for the week. More often than not, more than half of the programmes in Broadcast Audience Research Council of India (BARC) list of top 5 Kannada programmes in Karnataka during primetime are aired on it. Besides, on most weeks, Colors Kannada is the most watched Kannada channel based on BARC weekly data.

    Bhat needed the weekend programming of his flagship channel to be strengthened – he asked for it and got the rights for KK for his channel when Star India forsake the show after a not very successful season in 2018. Colors will air 41 episodes, of which 4 have already been canned, for the clone that has been tweaked for local Kannada audiences of the globally popular Who Wants To Be A Millionaire. Colors has tweaked the fourth season of KK a bit as compared to the previous editions – besides the changes that evolved with each season, the channel has brought back Kannada film icon Puneeth Rajkumar to host the show.

    Industry pundits peg the KK cost per episode at Rs 25 lakh or thereabouts. While not confirming the estimates, Bhat is confident that the show will be in the black. And he has his experience with Kannada Bigg Boss to back his confidence. “A property such as Kannadada Kotyadipathi attracts spot advertisers even during the day of the broadcast of the show,” he says. Bhat says that he is sure of them coming in, more so for the weekend, which incidentally, he feels is just an urban phenomenon. For rural folks all weekdays are the same, be they working days or weekends for the rest of the world. He has already roped in Wipro’s soap brand Santoor as presenting sponsor, Eastern Masala and detergent Rin as powered by sponsor and another soap brand – Chandrika Soap as special partner. His marketing is actively working out deals, he says.

    Colors has a 360-degree marketing plan to attract eyeballs for KK with touchpoints across on-ground, outdoor, radio, print, cross channel and digital. However, outdoor and billboard promos on the 500 to 600 Karnataka State Road Transport Corporation buses have been restricted to outside Bengaluru for now. Once the show starts Bhat plans to strategically release ads across media including print. Most of the creative work has been done in-house by the channel’s own teams.

    Company speak:

    Besides strengthening the weekend slot, there are other reasons for Colors doing the show. Here’s what Viacom18 Head of regional entertainment Ravish Kumar had to say via a press release: “The language content consumers have grown enormously over the years and though their tastes vary from region to region, they all converge at family game-show formats like Who Wants To Be A Millionaire. The universality of a quiz-show brings about cohesivity in viewing making it enjoyable and enhances captive engagement. Featuring real people and stories that showcase their aspiration and reason to win a substantial sum makes for a compelling content proposition.”

    Kumar further added, “Gauging the success of our previous two editions in different languages, we’re confident that Kannadada Kotyadipathi will certainly be well received by viewers as well as the advertisers on our channel, who rely on us to bring only the best of content to Kannada television.”

    Elaborating further, Bhat said, “Colors Kannada leads the roster in creating and presenting pathbreaking content for its viewers, and Kannada Kotyadipathi is yet another example of our commitment to be industry leaders. We’re luring audience to a form of entertainment that keeps them engaged as well as invested. While the format of the game remains unchanged, we’re scaling up the production and sprucing our treatment to make it more delightful for viewers across genres and milieu; and are also bringing back on board the indomitable superstar Puneeth Rajkumar who will multitask as a host, a friend and a guide.”

    KK is produced by Studio Next, the production house of Sony Pictures Networks. Studio Next holds the license of the format, for all Indian languages and has produced more than 1,800 episodes of the show across nine languages. The latest edition of KK will have an upgraded look and feel including an advanced set, claims a press release

    Studio Next head Indranil Chakraborty said, “We are extremely happy and privileged to bring the show to the people of Karnataka with their favourite host, Puneet Rajkumar and in the leading channel, Colors Kannada. We have maintained the same ethos of the show as in other languages, followed strict and transparent process for contestant selection and delivered production quality of the highest standards. Kannada Kothyadipathi will celebrate the great leveller of our society i.e. knowledge”.

  • Broadcasters see regional adex space growing

    Broadcasters see regional adex space growing

    MUMBAI: Now that the Hindi fervour has died down, broadcasters and advertisers have latched on to the regional segment. It's no wonder that the adex in the space is expected to grow as well.

    According to the global ad growth forecast of GroupM, India’s adex is expected to grow at 14.2 per cent compared to the global growth average of 3.9 per cent in 2019 and is likely to change. Indian adex has grown by 13.2 per cent in 2018 as per estimates by the media agency network. Moreover, according to the KPMG report 2018, regional and Hindi GECs continued to be the leading genres in terms of advertisement expenditure in FY18. However, the adex on Hindi GECs declined by 9 per cent in FY18 as compared to an increase of 5.4 per cent in adex on regional channels, outlining the overall growth of the regional market in India.

    Throwing light on the Tamil and Marathi genre, they saw a marginal decline of 2 per cent and 9 per cent respectively while other major regional languages such as Telugu, Kannada, Bengali, Malayalam and Oriya, saw a growth in their contribution to the overall adex in FY18. This indicates that other regional languages are picking up quick.

    In Februrary 2018, Viacom18 entered the Tamil GEC market with the launch of Colors Tamil, with an availability across 11 million households in Tamil Nadu and 22 hours of weekly original content at launch.  

    Commenting on the same, Viacom18 head regional entertainment Ravish Kumar said that part of it could possibly be caused by the FTA channels which have come up in Hindi. The viewership has moved to them and that has led to margin dilution as opposed to margin accretion. “On the regional space, you must have seen a lot of consolidation on the top end so where the strong are getting stronger and the weak are getting weaker, more margins are analysed which normally means that the ability to command high rates are high.” He added that it is backed up with a lot of investment in formats like reality, movie premiers or events which typically tend to command higher rates.

    He further added that the growth in regional space is in double digits. Commenting on the decline in Tamil and Marathi, Kumar said that the ratings of regional channels have only increased steadily over the years and short term ups and downs are expected.

    The other factors that would aid adex growth are big ticket events such as several state elections, government advertising and cricketing events. FMCG continues to contribute 51 per cent to the total television spends followed by telecom 12 per cent and auto 8 per cent that helped reach a growth of Rs 820 crore in television adex in 2017. Hindi GECs, including FTA, contributed 28 per cent of overall television adex and Hindi is by far the largest contributor to television adex.

    As per the report, Times Network MD and CEO MK Anand said, “2018 will be a good year for adex overall. The economy has more or less come to terms with the earlier disruptions. We don’t expect any major new policy changes since it’s an election-eve year. And not to forget, the 2017 base is a depressed one. So growth will be decent.”

    Speaking about the Bengali cluster, Zee Bangla had recently refreshed its channel’s campaign by observing a wide surge in the viewership off late. Meanwhile, in an interview with Indiantelevision.com, ZEEL business head for Zee Bangla and Zee Bangla Cinema Samrat Ghosh said that in terms of ad space, it has observed a good amount of contribution to the national players as well as the local players and it sees a lot of opportunity in West Bengal in the GEC space in terms of viewership. “As I have already said that the Bengal TV viewership is growing at a CAGR of 5 per cent whereas the ad expenditure is growing at 13 per cent.”

    Adding more relevance to Ghosh’s point, ZEEL cluster head regional markets Amit Shah said that the total Bengali TV ad market is pegged at Rs 1000 crore with 90 per cent of the spends going towards Bengal GECs. “National advertisers are seeing a lot of merit in choosing Bengal for their incremental purpose where the national brand is concerned. Now, most companies divide the country into zones. According to that division, East zone in most cases is growing faster than the rest of the country which itself means that there is some good momentum in the market.”

    Whereas, in terms of Kerala market ZEEL CMO Prathyusha Agarwal said that South GECs is a larger universe with larger audience. “It actually contributes 33 per cent viewership of the network and 23 per cent of the adex share. Hence, there is scope to grow there. The total adex in the Kerala market is estimated to be Rs 650-700 crore.”

    As per the reports, with increasing focus on quality content in the regional markets, the production costs also saw an increase in FY’18. The production cost of a single original episode in the southern languages ranged between Rs 1.75-2 lakh and the acquisition price for a single ready dubbed Hindi series episode was between Rs 35,000-50,000 per episode. The proportion of local advertisers in regional channels ranges from 40-60 per cent, with the remaining being national advertisers, and this mix is skewed in favour of local advertisers for regional GECs outside the top three to four.

    Star India south business MD K Madhavan said, “The content costs saw an increase in FY18 on account of significant improvements in the quality and production value of regional content. For non-fiction properties like Big Boss Tamil, the content costs were significantly higher, an indicator of the quality that audiences are now expecting.”

    It remains to be seen what does the year 2019 have to say to the broadcasters about adex in the near future.

  • Viacom18 announces new appointments to boost regional cluster

    Viacom18 announces new appointments to boost regional cluster

    MUMBAI: Viacom18 has announced a series of senior level hires for its regional TV cluster, bolstering its creative and content capabilities ahead of its plans to fortify its position across markets.

    Viacom18 head regional TV network Ravish Kumar said, “Regional is a big growth driver for Viacom18 as a network. The challenge, as well as the opportunity, lies in the diversity that regional as a space demands. While the different businesses of the organisation synergise to produce great content, each region and role require talented and committed people who understand the nuances typical to their regions. Each of the leaders, who have joined our regional entertainment space, is a stalwart in his/her space and role. I am excited that together, we can further strengthen our offering to our discerning viewers.”

    Deepak Rajyadhakshya has been appointed as Colors Marathi head. He has more than 18 years of experience in broadcast and entertainment, ranging across creative and business roles. He joined Viacom18 from the Zee Network where he headed the business for Zee Marathi before moving internally to spearhead the mainline Hindi GEC Zee TV. In his current capacity he will report to Viacom18 business head Marathi entertainment Nikhil Sane.

    Colors Tamil has two pivotal roles filled up with the inclusion of Raj Kannan as head, programming and Radha Ramamurthy as head, ideation. Kannan is an eloquent writer and speaker with 27 years of media experience in multi-channel content strategizing and content creation. Prior to joining Viacom18, he was working with the Vikatan Media Group as its brands and themes editor-in-chief where he played a distinctive part in handling the entire gamut of business in print and visual mediums. 

    Ramamurthy has 11 years of professional expertise in ideating and executing televised shows and events, brand building, marketing strategy and communications across diversified industries – Media, FMCG and Retail. She helps businesses connect with clients and consumers in novel and productive ways by bringing about mutually profitable interactions between these intersectional groups. Prior to joining Viacom18 she was working with Vikatan Media Group as their head of events and brand connect. She has also worked with Zee Tamil, Coca-Cola Beverages Pvt Ltd and Spencer’s Retail in the past. At Viacom18 both will be reporting to Colors Tamil business head Anup Chandrasekharan.

    For Colors Bangla, the network has appointed Aratrika Bhaumik as head, ideation. With 13 years of experience, Bhaumik has worked for more than a decade at Star India at the national as well as regional bases. 

    Also, Jayanta Bhattacharya has come onboard as head, OAP for Colors Bangla. With 16 years of experience, Bhattacharya moves in from Zee Bangla where he oversaw promo ideation. At Colors Bangla, Bhaumik and Bhattacharya will be in charge of scaling up the channel’s offerings under the guidance of Colors Bangla and Colors Odia head creative and content Suvonkar Banerjee.

    Previously working as the marketing head at the ABP group, Biswarup Das has joined Viacom18 as head marketing for Colors Bangla and Colors Odia. With 17 years of work experience under his belt, Das will spearhead the brand marketing and strategy for the channels and will work towards enhancing the strategic brand framework, brand architecture, and experience in the field. He will report to Viacom18 Bangla and Odia entertainment business head Rahul Chakravarti.

    In the Kannada Entertainment space, Abhaya Simha has been appointed as head –digital for Kannada Entertainment. Simha is a film director and a screenwriter. An alumnus of FTII – Pune, Abhaya’s debut venture, He has also worked with Star Suvarna and Prajavani and is a visiting faculty at many prestigious colleges across South India. At Viacom18, he will be responsible for incubating original concepts and shows in the Kannada language for VOOT. In his current capacity he will report to Viacom18 Kannada entertainment business head Parameshwar Bhat.

    For the cluster’s Gujarati space, Darshil Bhatt has joined as the programming head for Gujarati entertainment. Bhatt has 11 years of experience in the media industry. In his last stint with 94.3 MY FM as programming head he was responsible for leading and managing music, content, client solutions, brand marketing, programming, digital and production for 3 major stations. At Viacom18 he will be responsible for increasing the visibility and perception of the Gujarati entertainment vertical of the network. He will report to Kumar.

  • Prepare for three months of fireworks as COLORS SUPER premieres Bigg Boss Kannada – Season 6

    Prepare for three months of fireworks as COLORS SUPER premieres Bigg Boss Kannada – Season 6

    MUMBAI: Television viewing has never been the same, since the introduction of reality programming kingpin – Bigg Boss in India, and right from the onset Bigg Boss Kannada has entrenched its spot at the zenith becoming a favorite of viewers. Bearing testimony to its soaring ratings and expanding advertiser base, season after season, viewers have been treated to a form of entertainment, that’s not only hypnotic but also unrivalled across television industry. In season 5, Bigg Boss Kannada brought together the most volatile mix of celebrities & commoners under one roof, and this season, viewers will bear witness to their daily hour of flammable entertainment getting even more explosive. Lighting the fuse to this dynamite of reality content, host Kichcha Sudeep once again takes the reigns as host of Bigg Boss Kannada – Season 6, premiering this Sunday, October 21 at 6pm, on COLORS SUPER.

    Forecasting yet another successful season, Ravish Kumar, Head – Regional Entertainment, Viacom18, commented, “Keeping our viewers at the core of every decision, we’ve struck the right chords, while determining our offerings. Over the course of 3 glorious years, COLORS SUPER has ascended to unprecedented heights in terms of ratings, programming variety and advertiser interest. Bigg Boss Kannada is the epitome of entertainment buffet that tethers viewers to the television screens for the entire duration of the show. Being leaders in the industry, proffering the best of reality television, coupled with an unmatched fiction line-up, our Kannada channels have been championing the regional cluster of Viacom18.”

    “Despite being the youngest, COLORS SUPER has arisen as the fastest growing GEC on Kannada television and we continue to accelerate our endeavors to entertain viewers. Following the success of Bigg Boss Kannada – Season 5 and our scintillating line-up of fiction shows that keeps viewers glued, we’re now ready for another exciting season of Bigg Boss Kannada that will exhibit human character. As Sudeep yet again takes up reigns of the host, along with a combination of popular celebrities and deeply driven commoners, this season as well, we guarantee to enhance the all-round family–watching experience for our viewers.” added, Parameshwar Gundkal, Business Head – Kannada Entertainment Cluster, Viacom18.

    Puppeteering the strings of the housemates in Bigg Boss Kannada, host Kichcha Sudeep, elaborated “Bigg Boss Kannada is not like any other television show, and season after season, it continues to surprise not only viewers but me as well. As much as films, music, cricket and cooking are a part of my life, I feel this show is now ingrained in me. With umpteen surprises in store this season, I am extremely excited to continue as host for yet another year of this epic reality show.”

    Abhishek Rege, CEO – Endemol Shine, said "We at Endemol Shine India are motivated to create yet another blockbuster season for Bigg Boss Kannada. With nothing but pure entertainment driven content, this season too, will be high on twists and surprises for the housemates. And with Sudeep presenting a dynamic and interesting group of celeb and commoner contestants, this is sure to be one of the most intriguing seasons of Bigg Boss Kannada"

    Available on Viacom18’s video-on-demand platform – VOOT, within hours of its airing, fans of the Bigg Boss Kannada, will never miss a single moment of their favorite show.

    Targeting audience across the spectrum with a strategic combination of marketing mix including Outdoor, On-air, Print, Radio, Activations and Digital, COLORS SUPER has upped its promotional efforts to compliment the exceptional assortment in entertainment of Bigg Boss Kannada – Season 6.

  • Viacom18’s Colors Kannada Cinema aims to break even within 3 years

    Viacom18’s Colors Kannada Cinema aims to break even within 3 years

    MUMBAI: Viacom18 is making moves in the regional space. Its latest bet was to launch a movie channel for the Kannada market called Colors Kannada Cinema. The conglomerate has a Hindi movie channel called Rishtey Cineplex which broke even in two years. Similarly, the idea is to get the Kannada movie channel to break even within three years too.
    Viacom18 head regional entertainment Ravish Kumar told indiantelevision.com that that typically a movie channel or any other channel looks at three years to break even but Colors Kannada Cinema will break even before that. He explained that owning many titles makes it easier as it won’t have to spend on creating a library.
    With Colors Kannada and Colors Super gaining popularity, the channels aren’t able to accommodate many movies and so the need for a separate channel to utilise the assets was felt. The network has better leverage with more channels to showcase movies on.
    Surprisingly, Kumar said that pre-selling of ad inventory hasn’t been done for the new movies channel. “They undervalue your asset and the other point is people feel cheated if they put their faith in you and the return isn’t as expected,” he said. Instead, the idea is to get the channel going and work on distribution before thinking of ad rates.
    While production cost for Hindi keeps growing, Kumar says that there is a cap in the regional space. The increase will be inflation or technology led. He gave the example of a federation strike in West Bengal asking for an increase in technician rate. “That is going to lead to an overall 5-6 per cent increase across the board. But in a lot of the other markets, we have held costs and in some markets, we have actually reduced them,” he said. If the network decides to skew in favour of more reality shows or events, then the cost is likely to shoot up but fiction will see a moderate increase.
    According to the KPMG report 2018, adex on regional channels observed an increase of 5.4 per cent in FY18. Kumar said that part of it could possibly be caused by the FTA channels which have come up in Hindi. The viewership has moved to them and that has led to margin dilution as opposed to margin accretion. “On the regional space, you must have seen a lot of consolidation on the top end so where the strong are getting stronger and the weak are getting weaker, more margins are analysed which normally means that the ability to command high rates are high.” He added that it is backed up with a lot of investment in formats like reality, movie premiers or events which typically tend to command higher rates.

    He further added that the growth in regional space is seeing a double digit in the regions across markets. Talking specifically about the languages that observed a marginal decline in the adex, Tamil and Marathi saw 2 per cent and 9 per cent downfall respectively. Commenting on the same, Kumar said that looking at the longer point of view the ratings of regional channels have only increased steadily over the years and short term ups and downs are expected.
    Talking viewership, among all the regional language channels that Viacom18 has, Colors Bangla stood at third position with 74982 impressions ‘000 in the Bengali market according to the BARC data’s week 37. Colors Gujarati secured first position with 29915 impressions ‘000. Colors Kannada also stands at the leadership position with 461396 impressions ‘000. In the Marathi space, Colors Marathi secured second position with 136791 impressions ‘.

  • Colors Marathi adds traditional sports with Kusti Champions League

    Colors Marathi adds traditional sports with Kusti Champions League

    MUMBAI:  The local sports scenario in India is taking off on TV. Colors Marathi, Viacom18’s regional GEC, along with Maharashtra Wrestling Championship League (MWCL) Sports and Maharashtra State Wrestling Association together announced the launch of Kusti Champions League (KCL) – Apla Banda, Khel Zinda.

    Organised by MWCL Sports in association with Maharashtra State Wrestling Association, the live telecast of KCL will be aired exclusively on Colors Marathi and OTT app Voot. The league will premiere on 7 October 2018 and conclude its inaugural season with the grand finale on 28 October 2018. KCL will serve as a mega platform for the sport by inspiring and creating opportunities for local Maharashtrian players in the field. 

    Talking to Indiantelevision.com, Viacom18 head regional entertainment Ravish Kumar said, “Colors Marathi is delighted by the opportunity and down the road, we will continue to look forward to sports which are rooted and are a part of our tradition. This is first of its kind we are getting into, especially in the regional space.”   

    KCL will be played by six teams consisting of 72 players in total. KCL has selected over 300 players from across Maharashtra for an auction process.  Each team will consist of eight men and four women who are professionally trained in kusti. The cities participating in KCL are Mumbai, Pune, Nashik, Aurangabad, Nagpur and Kolhapur. A total of 90 matches across 21 days will be played on mat and soil at Balevadi Stadium, Pune in Maharashtra. 

    “If you look at the sport, it is very deep rooted throughout Maharashtra, with a long history and tradition and present at grassroot levels. It’s a great partnership as Colors Marathi is also rooted in terms of its content, being a regional channel we really appeal to the length and width of the state,” he added.

    “To uplift the sport further with an international approach towards mat wrestling, Kusti Champions League collectively aims to bring contenders from six regions of Maharashtra on one platform and establish them as strong contenders for Olympic 2020,” said KCL founder Pushkaraj Kelkar. “We want to take wrestling to every nook and corner of Maharashtra, give it the deserved fame and subsequently, create an international platform for the sport,” he added.

    Talking about the ad rates of KCL, Kumar said, “As the matches will be telecast at early prime-time from 5:30 to 6:30 pm, we are also waiting to see how the market will respond as we are doing it for the first time. The ad rates will be lower than that of primetime.”

    The six teams are Jigarbaaz Nashik, Kolhapur Shahu, Jaabaaz Aurangabad, Narveer Nagpur, Zunzaar Pune and Ranayoddha Mumbai. Each franchise will be given a salary purse of Rs 30 lakh in which it has to buy a minimum of 12 players.

    Maharashtra State Wrestling Association and Maharashtra Olympic Asociation General secretary Balasaheb Langdesaid, “Kusti, the most ancient sport of Maharashtra will now be presented to the audience through Colors Marathi. Prior to this, kabaddi has been viewed in league format which was a commercial success for both the players and organisers. Similarly, to ensure that this Kusti League is a successful initiative, we would require the support of the people of India. This league will play a vital role in the player’s morale for the 2020 Olympics.” 

    KCL COO Pradeep Iyengar said, “Wrestling has been one historical sport that has always contributed to India’s sporting prowess, and we are proud to be associated at the state level to take it into the next phase of upliftment and are keenly looking at least five medals from the state at the 2020 Olympics. Kusti Champion League is committed to bringing out the best from the state’s best.” 

    The official radio partner for Kusti Champion League Season 1 is Radio City.

    Earlier this year, DSport acquired the rights for Nidahas trophy, a tri-nation series tournament featuring India, Sri Lanka and Bangladesh. The channel joined hands with Viacom18 to live telecast the series in Hindi commentary on its mass entertainment channels Rishtey Cineplex and Cineplex HD. 

    In BARC week 10, Rishtey Cineplex climbed to the first position in the Hindi-speaking market with 545,931 impressions (000s) sum. It managed to match pubcaster DD Sports viewership leaving behind DSport in the urban plus rural (U+R) category. “This viewership was very impressive and it also brought to light that if people like a channel they expect to see everything on it,” Kumar concluded.

  • Colors Bangla prepares viewers for ‘Ke Hobe Banglar Kotipoti’

    Colors Bangla prepares viewers for ‘Ke Hobe Banglar Kotipoti’

    MUMBAI: Colors Bangla, the Bengali general entertainment channel by Viacom18 is going to launch its mega quiz show Ke Hobe Banglar Kotipoti on 16 July, Monday at 9 pm. Produced by Big Synergy, this weekday prime time game show is an adaptation from an American format named Who Wants to be a Millionaire. The show is about human stories and drama, piecing together some remarkable stories and giving such aspirants an opportunity of a lifetime that promises to transform their lives.

    Taking the reigns as host of the iconic game show, Bengali cinema’s stalwart Prosenjit Chatterjee has now become a dream weaver by proffering a prize of one crore with questions that can make the fortunes of a few lucky participants. Receiving an overwhelming response within days of announcement, aspiring participants from cities like Kolkata, Malda, Siliguri, Kharagpur, Durgapur and Howrah have been pouring in.

    “KBC is a much-loved format and is in line with the brand philosophy of Colors Bangla, ‘Tomar Sopner Rong’. It fuels aspirations and gives everyone a chance to fulfill their dreams. Our teams have done a phenomenal job of taking the platform to all segments of society and unearthed worthy contestants who have the drive in them to grab the opportunity and challenge their destiny. While we continue to engage viewers with quality and refreshing content, we are confident that Ke Hobe Banglar Kotipoti will change the lives of many,” said Viacom18 head- regional entertainment Ravish Kumar.

    Leaving no stone unturned for the promotion of the show, Colors Bangla has designed a 360-degree marketing and promotional campaign with touch points across on-ground, outdoor, radio, print, cross channels and digital. 

    Speaking about the success of the KBC franchise in India, BIG Synergy Media Limited creative producer Siddharth Basu said, “With Ke Hobe Bangla R Kotipoti, the KBC franchise has become more than just a quiz show. It is an enlightening journey filled with humane stories and unforgettable moments. The platform is more than a show; it is a life-changing experience for the participants based only on the power of their knowledge and nerve. Prosenjit is the perfect choice as host for the Bengali version of KBC, with his signature charisma and personality, making the show even more entertaining for the viewers of the show.”

    Taking it one notch higher, Viacom18’s digital platform, Voot, will give viewers an opportunity to feel the thrill and excitement of being a part of the game show through innovative and lucrative games week on week. On weekdays, viewers will get a chance to answer the ‘Bari Boshe Baajimaat’ (Ghar Baithe Jeeto Jackpot) question only available on VOOT to win Rs 50,000 every week, while on the weekends, viewers can play an emulation of the KBC game digitally and stand a chance to win a smartphone every week.