Saurabh Yagnik

Sony: Tushar Shah now heads English cluster, Saurabh Yagnik shifted to new role

MUMBAI: Sony Pictures Networks India (SPN has announced the following changes in the leadership team portfolio.

Saurabh Yagnik, will move into a newly created role of EVP – monetization strategy and consumer insights. In this role, Yagnik will lead the identification of organic and inorganic monetization opportunities in partnership with the revenue and channel heads, to increase SPN’s participation in the marketplace. He will also leverage consumer insights to identify and facilitate implementation of new business opportunities for the network. Yagnik moves into this new role from being SPN’s EVP and Business Head for the English cluster of channels, where he was heading AXN, Sony Pix, Sony Le Plex HD and Sony BBC Earth.

Tushar Shah will take on the role of EVP – AXN, Sony PIX, Sony Le Plex HD, Sony BBC Earth and Sony Aath. Shah moves into this role from being SPN’s EVP & Business Head –Sony Aath.

Both these roles will report into SPN CEO NP Singh.

Yagnik has been with SPN for over four and a half years and Tushar has been with SPN for over eleven years. These moves are in line with SPN’s philosophy of providing exciting career opportunities to internal talent and the network’s focus on the future.

August 31, 2017

Sony BBC Earth to air 19 hrs of content every week, local programming on the cards

MUMBAI: Feel alive with science, with technology, with nature, with stories, feel alive with Sony BBC Earth.

A 75:25 joint venture (JV) between Sony Pictures Networks India (SPN) and BBC Worldwide, the channel is set to go live on 6 March at 8 pm with 19 hours of original programming every week. The channel, in its initial phase, will target the urban mega cities constituting of 10 million towns. And is Available across all major DTH platforms and MSOs, in four languages- English, Hindi, Tamil and Telugu.

Promising to make the viewers ‘Feel Alive’ through its offering of quality
visuals, never-seen-before content, and positive insightful storytelling, the channel will introduce local programming in the country.

As of yet, BBC Worldwide operates around 39 BBC Earth channels across the world, in India, for the first time, the channel is launching as a joint venture with SPN. Through the JV partnership, SPN will make the day-to-day decisions of the new channel.

SPN CEO NP Singh said, “Sony Pictures Networks is known to create compelling and differentiated brands across all genres that it operates in. I am confident that this channel will be a major player in its category. A year down the line, I wish to see the channel in the top three list.”

Singh refused to mention the two companies that he thought were in the race.

The channel will bring award-winning, premium factual content from BBC to over 500 million of SPN’s viewers across India, and will feature some of the world’s famous factual film-makers and storytellers such as Sir David Attenborough – The Godfather of Natural History and other well-
known BBC Earth personalities like Bafta-winning English naturalist, writer and television presenter Steve Backshall, author, broadcaster and writer, Ben Fogle, Dr Michael Mosley – a medical doctor and an award-winning science journalist as well as award-winning wildlife cameraman, presenter and film maker, Gordon Buchanan. As a key differentiator in its category, the channel will have defined programming slots – Why, How & What on Earth at 8 pm for fun and insightful science, Wild Wild Earth at 9 pm for nature and wildlife, and Earth Explorers at 10 pm for adventure and human interest stories.

Weekends will showcase distinctive stories with a special slot; Earth Specials. Key launch shows include The Hunt, Where The Wild Men Are with Ben Fogle, Trust Me I’m A Doctor, Snow Chick and the iconic, greatly anticipated series, Planet Earth II amongst others.

BBC Worldwide president – global markets Paul Dempsey asserted, “Our relationship with Sony has been a long one, built in the first instance on our production business, and one that has since grown across all key areas of BBC Worldwide’s operations. We partner with them to bring top programmes like Sherlock, Orphan Black and Top Gear on AXN to our fans in India, and now, this joint venture which is a pioneering model for us. By working with a respected local partner of the caliber of Sony Pictures Networks, we look forward to bringing BBC Earth’s world class content to a new audience who we know has a huge appetite for premium factual programming.”

The channel has created a unique brand film with its Feel Alive ambassador Kareena Kapoor-Khan. The campaign will be launched on a massive scale across multiple mass media and social media platforms. Though, it has no advertisers on boards as of yet and are in the the process of locking few deals.

SPN EVP and business head English Cluster Saurabh Yagnik added, “SPN’s philosophy is to create brands based on deep consumer understanding. We have worked extensively with viewers to sharpen our insights into what they want and have synergised this understanding with our compelling content and storytelling. Our brand positioning of ‘Feel Alive’ captures the emotion of subliminal happiness which viewers experience when they consume our content. We are getting a tremendously positive response from the advertisers and will be locking few of them in couple of weeks time.”

The channel will primarily compete with powerful channels in the genre, National Geographic, Discovery Channel, and History TV18, owned by a joint venture between A+E Networks and TV18. The three channels are undergoing several programming changes by providing local, cutting edge content to the viewers.

According to media pundits, the entire factual entertainment genre in India is valued at Rs 1500 crore (by revenue) and is continuously growing at the rate of 13-15 per cent annually. It’s entertainment viewership accounts for 1-1.2 per cent of the total television viewership market share.

This partnership has definitely opened several doors for BBC making its way to the infotainment genre in India. Perhaps, the network may also consider launching its other channels – BBC Lifestyle, BBC Entertainment, BBC Kids, etc, in India. What next does the network plan to do in the Indian market, only time will tell…

Also Read :

Sony BBC Earth gets regulatory approval, to launch in India soon

BBC Worldwide’s factual entertainment successful in India

Sony BBC Earth is just an approval away: NP Singh

BBC Worldwide India: Women team makes fiction push

March 2, 2017

AXN campaign for ‘Sherlock’ with Social & Uber succeeds

MUMBAI: He came, we saw and he conquered. That is how Sherlock S4 in India can be summed up. AXN premiered the BBC drama in India with an integrated 360-degree marketing campaign. Taking cues from the global campaign, AXN India adapted the international thought ‘It’s not a game anymore’ and created an India-specific, clutter-breaking campaign.

The fans loved the concept which in turn garnered quality social media conversations around the campaign tagline and the show.

Sony Pictures Networks India EVP and business head – English cluster Saurabh Yagnik said, “AXN is an aspirational brand for the youth so we strategically partnered with other aspirational youth brands – Social and Uber. We were able to engage with our target audience more efficiently and effectively creating a win-win proposition for all. The response from viewers has been phenomenal. We trended on Twitter for over 110 hours during the campaign period. AXN is home to Sherlock and we reinforced our position as the best destination for iconic shows and characters.”

With an aim to further the Sherlock craze, all marketing elements like on-air promotions, social media buzz, on-ground association, outdoor campaigns, radio spots and PR tools were strategically used to make the premiere a huge success.

The integrated activities began with a month long on-air campaign that included one-of-a-kind association with India’s leading app Uber and buzziest youth hangout joint Social. The first step was for Uber travelers to unlock the Sherlock code on the Uber app. This resulted in top 100 winners of the activity to watch exclusive screening of Sherlock season 4 episode before the India premiere.

Uber GM Mumbai and West Shailesh Sawlani added, “We tied up with AXN to give our riders across Mumbai, Delhi and Bangalore a first-hand flavour of Sherlock, this season. The campaign saw a great response across the three cities and it was a phenomenal experience for the ardent fans to simply enter a promo code to attend the exclusive screening.”

The three-week long collaboration with Social enabled fans to experience Sherlock’s eccentric lifestyle by being part of an exciting treasure hunt across key Social outlets in India. The fans also got photographs clicked at the Sherlock zone created at the venue, which was equipped with Sherlock props, and win exclusive AXN hampers.

AXN got on board stand-up comedian of EIC fame, Azeem Banatwalla to take viewers through the Sherlock voyage. A 5-minute crash course to all the previous episodes coupled with his wacky humour, got the more than one million views creating tremendous buzz online.

Impresario (parent company of Social) director – marketing and strategy Shobita Kadan added, “We were delighted to partner with AXN and provide a platform for the first ever screening of Sherlock for which we share a common audience. Our patrons; true Sherlockians got the opportunity to enjoy the screening well before anyone else in the country. A 360-degree brand experience was curated through various touch points such as a fun treasure hunt, an interactive photo booth and fun giveaways to reinstating the culture-defining Social experience.”

February 8, 2017

Kareena is Sony BBC Earth ambassador

MUMBAI: The soon-to-be launched factual entertainment channel Sony BBC Earth has roped in the vivacious and versatile Kareena Kapoor Khan as its ‘Feel Alive’ Ambassador. This is the first time that the actress has become part of a factual entertainment channel.

Kareena is known to have a spirited, ‘full-of-life’ personality both on and off-screen. Her vibrant persona coupled with her love for the natural world were the key factors in opting for Kareena to represent the most awaited channel of 2017.

Sony Pictures Networks India EVP and business head – English cluster Saurabh Yagnik said, “Kareena Kapoor Khan’s personality perfectly resonates with our brand proposition and channel content, which will be revealed soon. I am confident that this unique association will take the factual entertainment experience to a whole new level for our viewers in India.”

Also Read:

Sony BBC Earth is just an approval away: NP Singh

Sony BBC Earth gets regulatory approval, to launch in India soon

February 8, 2017

Guest Column: English content consumption showed upward trend in 2016

Consumption of English content continued to show growing trends during the year 2016 and the momentum is expected to be sustained this year as well. An interesting and encouraging trend was the continual surge in Hollywood box office collections in India as compared to previous years. This reflects the growing affinity of Indian audience towards English content. There has also been substantial growth in social media conversations on Hollywood and other English content and expect the trend to continue in a big way in 2017.

Coming to Hollywood movie channels, the key to success is to have a strong pipeline of premieres and library films. This is at the core of our business and a big reason why we invested aggressively to get the best content for our viewers. The tie up with NBC Universal enhanced our programming with blockbuster films and franchises like Jurassic World, Fast& Furious, Minions, Steve Jobs, Straight Outta Compton, Jason Bourne, Sing and Secret Life of Pets to name a few. We have also extended the PIX Brand to the South Asian markets.

Our market research indicated that the audiences are segmenting into two parts. One that loves mainstream cinema. The second is that loves good cinema, irrespective of the fact it being mainstream or not. We capitalised on this opportunity with launch of our new movie channel in 2016 – Sony Le PLEX HD – which brings to its viewers movies that are critically acclaimed and are based on powerful stories and characters. Our objective was to create a differentiated product and present content in a never-seen-before manner, while positioning the channel as a fun hangout for the community of movie lovers who converse around quality cinema. With premieres of Oscar winning film like Spotlight, The Walk, Concussion and other acclaimed movies on the new channel we have opened up an opportunity to consume great cinema for an audience set whose needs were grossly underserved.

In the English general entertainment space we relaunched our flagship channel AXN making it more contemporary and appealing to the audience through the new brand positioning – Live R.E.D. We were able to build strong character and show associations with the channel which was one of the key tasks we had set out to achieve. Our content is highly diverse, which is reality, entertainment and drama – and that is what Live R.E.D stands for. From a viewer gratification perspective, LIVE R.E.D. stands for Rush Excitement and Dream; that is what our shows provide. We have leveraged R.E.D. to define our characters as well. For example, Live Eccentric, Live R.E.D defines Sherlock’s character.

In the general entertainment category, there exists two distinct audience segments. The first set is called the influencer and the other set is called the adopters. While the influencer is an audience who is clued on to the latest shows as and when they are released worldwide, the adopters are those who are easing into the category and would want to consume long running cult shows. Our programming caters to both the audience segments. It consists of new as well as old shows that have been well received by the US audience. For instance, under AXN’s property Fresh from the US, we enable the audience to watch the latest and popular shows closer to the US timeframe like Sherlock, Billions, Orphan Black, Bull, Elementary and Supernatural to name a few. Getting to watch new shows on their TV sets will certainly discourage the viewers from downloading content and help curb piracy.

2017 is going to be a year where we will consolidate the gains from our investments of the previous year. Our programming strategy is likely to remain consistent with the previous year and we don’t foresee significant changes in the audience behaviour or need.

Maintaining our loyal fan base along with targeting fresh consumers is another task at hand and I am sure we will execute it well. We have a lot of exciting content in store for the year 2017 across channels as we strive to bring the best of Hollywood to our viewers. And we start all of this with the much awaited premiere of Sherlock season 4 on AXN.

(The writer is EVP and Business Head, English Cluster, Sony Pictures Networks, India. Views expressed in this article are personal and Indiantelevision.com need not necessarily subscribe to them.)

January 10, 2017