MUMBAI: Republic TV, spearheaded by Arnab Goswami, and Business Television India (BTVI) have entered into an alliance for content and programming around Union Budget 2018. The Republic TV- BTVI alliance promises to offer viewers a distinctive experience. In the days ahead, both partners will work together to combine their respective domain knowledge around Union Budget 2018 programming.
Republic TV CEO Vikas Khanchandani said, “Union Budget 2018 is the most anticipated budget, with major announcements expected one year post demonetisation and GST implementation. Republic TV, along with BTVI, will bring together leading financial experts across sectors, think-tanks, global investors and the country’s best editorial minds to present the most insightful and sharp perspective of the Budget.”
Despite a decline in viewership in the news genre, Republic TV has managed to maintain its pole position in ratings.
BTVI COO Megha Tata said, “We are very excited about this association. Republic TV’s credibility in news coverage and BTVI’s expertise in English business news space will create a unique proposition for the viewers of Union Budget 2018. With the two forces joining hands, I am very confident about delivering an all-around perspective to our viewers.”
Tag: Republic TV
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Republic TV, BTVI join hands for budget coverage
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Republic TV continues lead as genre ratings rise
BENGALURU:Two of weeks earlier, we had mentioned that the English News genre’s four week average ratings and weekly ratings have been falling since weeks 29 to 32 of 2017. The fall continued until week 47 of 2017 when the combined Broadcast Audience Research Council of India (BARC) weekly ratings of the top-five English News genre channels (All India (U+R) : NCCS AB : Males 22+ Individuals) fell to 1.877 million weekly impressions. The leader of the pack right from the week it launched–the Arnab Goswami-headed Republic TV–recorded the lowest ever ratings of 0.511 million weekly impressions in week 47 of 2017. The fortunes of the genre seem to have turned in week 48 of 2017 (Saturday, 25 November 2017 to Friday, 1 December 2017). The combined ratings of the top-five English News genre channels smartly increased to 2.116 million weekly impressions. However, this increase was not enough to avert the genre’s lowest four-week average ratings–1.893 million for weeks 45 to 48 of 2017 since the launch of Republic TV in week 19 of 2017.
Refer to the chart below showing the four-week average of the top-five English News channels between weeks 1 to 48 of 2017. It may be noted that that the data for week 21 has not been considered in this report and, hence, the four-week average weekly impressions of 2.6327 million for the W22-24 period is actually a three-week average.
Revisiting what we had said earlier—with addition of data for weeks 47 and 48 of 2017—the combined ratings of the top-five English News channels for weeks 1 to 48 of 2017 increased from the lowest viewership to date of 1.179 million weekly impressions in week 2 to the highest viewership in week 11 of 4.987 million weekly impressions. The ratings then started to decline until week 19 of 2017 which saw the launch of Republic TV.
In week 19 of 2017, the genre witnessed its second highest combined weekly ratings of the top-five channels to date of 4.282 million weekly impressions. Republic TV has topped the genre right from the first week of its launch to date in 2017. Goswami’s channel helped increase the genre’s overall ratings but its eyeballs pull could only retard the slow decline that the genre has seen since then as can be seen from the chart above.
Since news is event driven, the above statements also are evident if one were to go by the four-week average weekly impressions of the combined ratings of the top-five English News genre rather than weekly numbers. As mentioned above, the data for week 21 has not been considered in this report and, hence, the four-week average weekly impressions of 2.6327 million for the W22-24 period is actually a three-week average.
In week 11 of 2017 (Weeks 9 to 12), elections results in five states of the country were announced and hence the ratings of news channels peaked. Weeks 13 to 16 saw a decline in the genre’s ratings, because week 14 of 2017 saw the launch of the Indian Premier League, which adversely affected the News genre’s ratings. Weeks 17 to 20 were Republic TV’s launch period and everyone wanted to see how Goswami would perform on his new English News channel, the genre’s ratings climbed to a four week average of 2.972 million. The four weeks (or rather 3 weeks’ average in this specific case) of weeks 22-24 was a small blip, and since the other English News channels withdrew themselves from BARC ratings, the data will not be discussed any further here.
Weeks 25 to 28 numbers for the top-five channels saw the four-week average ratings climb to 2.9155 million weekly impressions, followed by the highest four-week average of the genre in 2017 until now of 3.2695 million weekly impressions in weeks 29 to 32. As is evident from the figure above, the genre’s four-week average ratings have only declined since then.
Will the genre be able to garner improved ratings for the rest of weeks of 2017? Or will they slide, or remain stagnant? This is something that time will tell.
Data for week 48 of 2017
The top-five channels for week 48 of 2017 were the same as week 47 of 2017. The channels retained the same ranks during the week under review as compared to the trailing week, but at the cost of lower viewership.
As mentioned above, Republic TV held the top rank in the genre during week 48 of2017 with 0.709 million weekly impressions, followed by Times Now with 0.621 million weekly impressions at second place. India Today Television came in at third place with 0.294 million weekly impressions, lower than the 0.340 million weekly impressions it had garnered for week 47 of 2017. NDTV 24×7 was ranked fourth with 0.263 million impressions in week 48, slightly lower than the 0.289 million weekly impressions in week 47. At fifth place was CNN News 18 with 0.229 million weekly impressions in week 48 of 2017 as compared to the 0.25 million weekly impressions in week 47 of 2017.
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Republic TV, Times Now viewership moves up as genre ratings fall
BENGALURU: The two top-ranked channels of the Indian English news genre saw small increases in their weekly viewership in week 46 of 2017 (Saturday, 11 November 2017 to Friday, 17 November 2017, period, week under consideration) as compared to the nadir of the previous week. Data from the Broadcast Audience Research Council (BARC) show that the genre topper from the time of its launch 28 weeks ago Republic TV saw its ratings increase to 0.566 million weekly impressions in week 46 from 0.524 million weekly impressions in week 45. The second-ranked Times Now saw its ratings increase to 0.502 million weekly impressions during the week under consideration from 0.489 million weekly impressions in the previous week.
The other three channels from the top five English saw no change in ranks, but decline in viewership in the period as compared to week 45. They were: NDTV 24×7 at third place with 0.260 million weekly impressions (0.299 million weekly impressions in week 45); India Today Television with 0.250 million weekly impressions (0.295 million weekly impressions in week 45); and CNN News18 with 0.185 million weekly impressions (0.205 million weekly impressions in week 45).
Genre ratings continue declining
The English news genre has seen a decline in ratings over the past few weeks. Analysis of BARC data for the combined ratings of the top five English news channels for weeks 1 to 46 of 2017 increased from the lowest viewership to date of 1.179 million weekly impressions in week 2, to the highest viewership in week 11 to date of 4.987 million weekly impressions. The ratings then started to decline until week 19 of 2017 which saw the launch of the Arnab Goswami-led Republic TV.
In week 19 of 2017, the genre witnessed its second-highest combined weekly ratings of top five channels to date of 4.282 million weekly impressions. Republic TV has topped the genre right from the first week of its launch to date in 2017. Goswami’s channel helped increase the genre’s overall ratings, but its eyeball pull could only retard the slow decline that the genre has seen since then as can be seen from the chart below.
Since news is event-driven, the above statements also are evident if one were to go by the four week average weekly impressions of the combined ratings of the top five English news genre, rather than weekly numbers. It may be noted that the data for week 21 has not been considered in this paper and hence the four week average weekly impressions of 2.6327 million for the W22-24 period is a three-week average. Further, the number for the last point on the graph (W45-46) of 1.7895 weekly impressions is a 2-week average.
In week 11 of 2017 (Weeks 9 to 12), elections results in five states of the country were announced and hence the ratings of news channels peaked. Weeks 13 to 16 saw a decline in the genre’s ratings because week 14 of 2017 saw the launch of the Indian Premier League. Weeks 17 to 20 were Republic TV’s launch period and as everyone wanted to see how Goswami would perform, the genre’s ratings climbed to a four week average of 2.972 million. The average of weeks 22-24 was a small blip, and since the other English News channels withdrew themselves from BARC ratings, the data will not be discussed any further here.
Weeks 25 to 28 numbers for the top five channels saw the 4-week average ratings climb smartly to 2.9155 million weekly impressions, followed by the highest four week average of the genre in 2017 until now of 3.2695 million weekly impressions in weeks 29 to 32. As is evident from the figure below, the genre’s 4-week average ratings have only declined since then.
Ratings for the same period of the previous year can’t truly be compared to see if decline is a periodic trend because news is generally event driven as mentioned above. For example, in 2016, demonetisation was announced on November 8; in week 28 of 2017, ratings of the Hindi news genre peaked because the Supreme Court’s Ram Rahim verdict was announced in that week.
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The rise and fall of English news’ TV viewership
NEW DELHI: Tongues have been wagging in the industry that the English news genre viewership levels and ratings have not only been yo-yoing but also declining. From a high of an average weekly viewership of 3788 (‘000) impressions in the Broadcast Audience Research Council (BARC) data from week 27-30, the figure has come down dramatically to 2514 (‘000) impressions in weeks 43-45.
However, a quick analysis of viewership data reveals that there doesn’t seem to be any sinister reason or rocket science involved. Viewing, as experts say, is largely a seasonal affair for various genres. For example, during summer school holidays viewership of movie channels and general entertainment channels – and to some extent even factual entertainment or infotainment channels – see a spike in viewership only because kids and moms possibly get to do more TV watching.
As far as English news genre is concerned, which forms a miniscule of the total viewership pie, questioning the fan following is not correct. In fact, the English news genre has seen a gradual growth in the period between BARC weeks 8-45; especially since the time the ratings agency rolled out the new TV universe estimate.
The genre hit a high of 5.3 million impressions in week 11, but that was because of the crucial assembly poll results week. In a country where everyone has a political view, high viewership is understandable as most people would be searching for more political and election-related news and information, said an industry expert who has been tracking TV news channels in general.
BARC India data available with Indiantelevision.com highlights that after the launch of Republic TV and the emergence of Arnab Goswami in a new avatar, the English news genre had hit levels of 4.6 million impressions, but has now settled at an average 2.3 millions impressions – levels English news genre was perched at prior to launch of Republic TV.
Source: BARC India. NB: Republic TV launched in week 19. Data: All India, Male 22+ AB; Average Weekly Impressions (in ‘000); period of consideration: Week 8-45
Though competitors and critics of Arnab may not like to admit, data shows that after the launch of Republic TV the entire English news genre (including most existing players) saw a significant growth in viewership. As another industry observer pointed out, the reasons for this new-found love for English news could be for the following reasons:
-When a much anticipated and promoted event occurs (launch of Republic and return of Arnab notably) inevitably viewer interest spikes that gets funnelled into the genre.
– Also, the new channel launched with special content (stings, etc) led to the competition simultaneously airing special shows that were planned and canned earlier. All these again contributed to drive up viewership.
– Such viewership spikes (led by events like elections, results or cricket matches featuring India) are inevitable and settle down to organic levels over the long term; even Republic TV ratings have fallen from dizzying heights at the time of its debut.
That’s exactly what’s happening now with English news genre, the industry observer explained, driving home the point that TV channels should not jump to conclusions based on week-to-week swings. Earlier, there was one leader in the genre (notably Times Now), but now the category has two strong players. This too impacts viewership and rankings within the genre in the way as being witnessed now.
“English news as a genre has always been a story of new challengers introducing disruptions and dethroning the existing leader. From NDTV 24×7 to CNN New18 to Times Now to Republic TV, the story has repeated itself reflecting also the swing in viewer preference as newer products are introduced in the market,” a TV critic said, adding that for niche genres like English news it’s always advisable to look at long-term trends, larger period clusters, rather than week on week insights.
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BARC: English & Hindi News genres show decline in ratings
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Republic TV continues to lead English news genre despite bumps
BENGALURU: Broadcast Audience Research Council of India’s (BARC) weekly data for week 45 of 2017 (Saturday, 4 November 2017 to Friday, 10 November 2017) reveals that Republic TV’s viewership has reached a new low point since it was launched in May 2017. Despite garnering just 0.524 million weekly impressions during the week under consideration, Republic TV still led the Indian English news genre for the 27th week in a row right from its launch week—week 19 of 2017. The Arnab Goswami-led channel has steadfastly held on to the first rank that it grabbed from Times Now in week 19, garnering genre-topping viewership of 2.117 million weekly impressions. Even if one were to eliminate data for week 21 when the other Indian English news channels with the backing of the News Broadcasters Association (NBA) withdrew from BARC ratings, Republic TV has had a remarkable run so far.
With a dip in Republic TV ratings, the combined ratings of the top-five channels (All India (U+R): NCCS AB: Males 22+ Individuals) during week 45 have also dipped to the lowest ratings ever since the launch of Republic TV. The combined weekly ratings of the top-five English news channels for the week under consideration are just 1.816 million impressions, much lower than the impressions that Republic TV alone had garnered in week 19 of 2017.
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Republic TV launches Android app
MUMBAI: Republic TV is on a roll. From rocking the ratings chart in launch week itself to going international, the channel has added one more accomplishment to its kitty. The Republic TV Android app is now live.
Claiming to be the lightest on phone storage but ‘heaviest on news’, there are three unique features. First is the ‘vertical format’ feature which ensures a deeply personal and engaging HD live video streaming experience optimised for portrait viewing on mobile phones. This feature relies on the debate production being specially produced and streamed in real-time in a 9:16 video format.
Second is the ‘interactive format’ feature where the app users can directly engage and talk to Arnab Goswami, anchors and panellists on Live TV. This technological innovation will allow users to participate in on-air debates in real-time by expressing their opinion and immediately respond to breaking news stories on-air.
Written entirely in Kotlin with an extremely tiny memory footprint of just 3.6 MB, gives it its third feature of being the lightest English news app.
Republic TV founder and editor in chief Arnab Goswami said, “Republic has been on super-fast expansion spree – we launched the channel in May, the website in July and now the app in November. I am so proud of my entire team and the technology team especially, who after months of determined effort have produced one of the world’s lightest news apps without compromising on the content or video quality for a superior user experience. With the app, Republic has established itself as a media -tech company which reflects in our new tagline – Republic- Digital. TV. Media.”
RepublicWorld COO Jay Chauhan said, “Since our inception earlier this year, we’ve been focused on newer ways of driving engagement with our content and delivering the best possible user experience. That’s reflected in our strategy to invest in amazing technology and content teams, produce live and VoD content in mobile specific aspect ratios, our choice of the tech stack and a host of other interactive and personalisation features part of our product pipeline.”
The Republic World App brings to users the widest range of trending stories, viral videos and angular opinion from across news genres of politics, sports, business, regional, lifestyle, travel, wheels, music, gadgets and society.
Using its top editorial partnerships news stories and video content is provided in English, Hindi, and eight Indian regional languages including Telugu, Kannada, Malayalam, Marathi, Bengali, Tamil, Odia and Gujarati.
The iOS app will launch by the end of November.
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Indian English News genre facing festival blues?
BENGALURU: Is the Indian English News genre facing pre and post festival blues? For that certainly seems to be case when one looks at Broadcast Audience Research Council of India (BARC) weekly data for weeks 1 to 43 of 2017. Ratings of the genre dipped in the week leading to, during and the week after India’s biggest festival season – Diwali. The main Diwali days were in during week 42 of 2017. It may be noted that ratings for week 21 of 2017 have not been considered in this paper because in that week English News channels with the support of the News Broadcasters Association (NBA) excluding Republic TV had withdrawn from BARC ratings measurement in protest against what they claimed were unfair practices by Republic TV.
BARC weekly data for the top 5 English News genre (All India (U+R) : NCCS AB: Males 22+ Individuals) shows that the lowest combined ratings of the top 5 English News channels in 2017 until week 43 was in week 2 of 2017 (Saturday, 7 January 2017 to Friday 13 January 2017) at 1.179 million weekly impressions. Week 1 of 2017, with 1.218 million weekly impressions, had the second lowest ratings in 2017 until week 43.
The highest combined ratings of the top 5 English News channels in 2017 until week 43 of 2017 were in week 11 (Saturday, 11 March 2017 to Friday 17 March 2017) at 4.897 million weekly impressions– this was the week during which the election results of five states in India were announced. The second highest combined ratings of the top 5 English News channels were in the week that Republic TV was launched – week 19 of 2017 (Saturday, 6 May 2017 to Friday 12 May 2017) and the combined weekly ratings of the top 5 English News channels were 4.282 million, with Republic TV garnering about half the ratings of the genre – 2.115 million weekly impressions.
After that second peak, the combined ratings of the top 5 English News channels have been on the decline, with a nadir of 1.986 million weekly impressions in the pre Diwali week 41 of 2017 (Saturday, 7 October 2017 to Friday, 13 October 2017). Ratings for week 41 of 2017 were the fifteenth lowest ratings of the genre during the first 43 weeks of 2017 and the lowest ratings after the launch of Republic TV. In week 42 or Diwali week, the genre experienced the seventeenth lowest ratings in 2017 to date, and the second lowest ratings after the launch of Republic TV – 2.050 million weekly impressions. In week 43 (Saturday, 21 October 2017 to Friday, 27 October 2017), the combined ratings of the top 5 channels experienced a slight dip again at 2.206 million weekly impressions.
Now, for slight digression. The Arnab Goswami led Republic TV is a major force to reckon with in the English News genre. Right from its launch, the channel has been garnering a huge chunk of the genres combined ratings. It has usurped the previous leader Times Now numero uno position in the English News genre from the very first week of its launch to date in 2017.
Republic TV’s average contribution to the combined ratings of the top 5 English News channels is about 36 percent – more than a third. In its launch week, the channel had contributed 49.44 percent to the combined ratings of the top 5 English News channels. Its lowest contribution to the genre’s ratings has been 30.56 percent in week 35 of 2017 (Saturday 26 August 2017 to Friday, 1 September 2017) – the channel had scored 0.899 million weekly impressions of the genre top 5 channels ratings combined total of 2.942 million weekly impressions. Hence the figure below shows two curved lines – one that includes the ratings of the top 5 English News channels including Republic TV and another that shows the combined ratings of the second, third, fourth and fifth ranked channels, or ratings without Republic TV ratings (w/o Republic TV).
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Republic TV enters MENA via OSN Pehla
MUMBAI: English news channel Republic TV is riding to the Middle East and North Africa (MENA) with its first international launch. The newest kid on the block has tied up with local pay-TV provider to launch on OSN Pehla on 5 November.
Launched in May this year by stalwart journalist and former face of Times Now, Arnab Goswami, the channel surged up the records chart in its first week and has claimed a significant pie of the English news space.
Republic TV,president of distribution and international revenues Priya Mukherjee adds, “Since our inception earlier this year, Republic TV has strived towards widening the reach of our cutting-edge content. While we successfully executed the reach of Republic TV across all households in the fragmented Indian cable distribution ecosystem during the first six months of the channel, our next target would be to reach audiences across the world. Our launch in the MENA region is our first foray in international distribution and we hope to expand our reach further with audiences around the world soon.”
Indiantelevision.com had reported that the channel was to launch in the MENA market by June, followed by a launch in Singapore.
Republic TV CEO Vikas Khanchandani says, “Demand from the market has been over whelming and we are extremely delighted to bring Republic TV to the audiences in MENA through OSN. We will also look to create original content specific to the MENA markets in due course and Priya and her team will be offering advertisers the most impactful news media platform reaching discerning audiences in the region.”
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Hotstar is an important platform for us: ABP’s Avinash Pandey
MUMBAI: The days of tuning into the news channel at 7 pm in your living room are gone. Today’s consumers want news to come to them not vice versa. Taking note of this, ABP News bought a Hotstar ticket, which boasts of 10 million downloads on Android devices.
ABP is the first Hindi news channel on the platform. New entrant Republic TV had secured a place in May this year.
ABP COO Avinash Pandey feels it unwise to consider Hotstar as a media product. He rather gives it the title of a platform in itself. “The exponential growth in business happens when you move from product delivery to platform delivery. A platform becomes a dissemination medium when multiple people for multiple reasons converge. Hotstar is a promising and future-ready platform and it is important to be on such a destination,” he says.
ABP shares its DNA with Star India since the channel was formerly called Star News – a partnership between ABP and Star from 2003 till Star decided to give up news for giving attention to entertainment in 2012. The synergy made a compelling case for both to unite.
The deal benefits both parties. While ABP can reach a large audience on a trusted platform, Star can give value addition to its Hindi-speaking audience via ABP News. Let us not forget the increased traction that advertisers will get through it.
At the 13th Indian Digital Operators Summit 2017, BARC India CEO Partho Dasgupta highlighted that the Hindi news genre grew by 93 per cent in week 41 of 207 over 2015. Pandey calls this growth as exponential, not progressive.
“People want news as video rather than text and heavy consumption happens via mobiles and tablet due to lower data charges,” says Pandey. The channel is cooking up something as he says that this partnership is just ‘the tip of the iceberg’ and more should be expected.
With the latest addition, Hotstar has live feeds of five channels – Fox News, Sky News, Asianet News, Republic TV and ABP news.
As per the comScore report for April 2017, ABP News had 20.7 million viewers on mobile out of the total 200 million news population on digital. It had just 1.7 million views via desktop devices. The report also showed that people across ages, both male and female prefer mobile to desktop any day.
Star India chairman and CEO Uday Shankar had earlier said, “Young India has embraced Hotstar. We believe that young, digital-savvy Indians are deeply interested in understanding their country and the world they live in.”
Hotstar has managed to hook viewers to its entertaining content. Now can it manage to get them to spend more time watching news as well?
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Dominance of Republic TV continues as genre ratings plunge
BENGALURU: The Arnab Goswami-led Republic TV continued to lead the English News genre as the combined weekly ratings of the top 5 English News channels for week 41 (Saturday, 7th October 2017 to Friday, 13th October 2017) reached a new nadir – the lowest ratings in the second half year of 2017 to date.
The combined weekly ratings of the top 5 English News channels (All India (U+R) : NCCS AB : Males 22+ Individuals) in week 41 of 2017 according to Broadcast Audience Research Council of India (BARC) were a measly 1.986 million impressions, lower than the peak viewerships of the top two channels in some weeks of 2017. The combined ratings of the top 5 English News channels in week 41 were the fifteenth lowest in 2017 to date. It may be noted that ratings for week 21 have not been considered in this paper.
Despite topping the genre, Republic TV reported its lowest ratings since it launched on 6 May 2017 (Week 19 of 2017) – the channel scored just 0.685 million weekly impressions. Another regular in BARC’s weekly list of top 5 English News channels – CNN News 18, also garnered its lowest weekly ratings for the year to date in week 41 of 2017. The channel was ranked 5 in week 41 with 0.173 million weekly impressions.
Goswami’s previous employer – Times Now was ranked second in week 41 of 2017 – its usual rank after the launch of Republic TV, scoring its eighth lowest viewership in 2017 to date with 0.59 million weekly impressions. India Today Television scored its fourth lowest ratings in 2017 to date with 0.286 million weekly impressions in week 41 of 2017. India Today TV was ranked fourth in week 41 of 2017, after NDTV 24×7 that scored 0.252 million weekly impressions at third place. It may be noted that NDTV 24×7 has not found a place in the weekly top 5 English News channels during all the 41 weeks of 2017 till date, hence its ratings relative to other weeks in 2017 have not been mentioned in this paper.
In the meantime, just post 1100am when detailed BARC data is released to paid subscribers, both the leading English News genres channels – Republic TV and Times Now continued their online tirade, each claiming numero uno status in the genre after slicing and dicing BARC data in a manner than showed each in good light. It may be noted that BARC data is generally released on Thursday for the previous Saturday to Friday period at 1100 hours to paid subscribers. Data for top 5 or top 10 channels or programmes or advertisers is also released on Thursday to the public at 1300 hours on its website.