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Tag: Star Sports

  • For creative agencies, Vivo IPL is India’s SuperBowl

    For creative agencies, Vivo IPL is India’s SuperBowl

    MUMBAI: For 11 years now, the Vivo Indian Premier League (IPL) has entertained the country as no other sporting event has. Not just the cricketers on the pitch but brands, marketers and advertisers have gradually upped their game to keep viewers engaged during the sporting extravaganza.

    In a bid to bring the advertising culture to the forefront of Indian sports broadcasting, Star India built a platform called the Re.Imagine Awards to recognise and encourage the creativity and innovation in the use of integrated media in advertising campaigns aired during Vivo IPL on Star Sports and its OTT platform Hotstar.

    This initiative by Star gets all the marketers, media and creative agencies to join hands, thereby pushing all stakeholders to innovate the advertising experience.

    First year of Re.Imagine Awards was a major success, with all the big brands and agencies participating. Over 300 campaigns by 120 brands vied for the awards. Brand Factory, Amazon, Dr.FIXIT, Sprite, Peter England, Swiggy, Tata Sky, Vivo and Fevikwik were some of the brands that jostled against one another to bag top honours.

    Brands have long recognised the power and popularity of cricket in India. However, with the video proliferation and regional language market expansion, more avenues seem to have opened up for the marketers to position their products.

    “The Re-imagine awards are quite unique. The fact that it focuses on one event (Vivo IPL) and the work generated and aired in it makes it interesting. Especially since the event by itself is both a massive opportunity for brands and equally a challenge of sorts to stand out in the storm of brands advertising in it. The shorter format further pushes the challenge bit. Another special feature of Re-imagine is the judging criteria of both creativity and integration," Lowe Lintas CCO Sagar Kapoor said.

    In 2018, winners of Re.imagine awards were Fevikwik for Khushiyon ke chand pal and Swiggy for No order too small. After its campaign during Vivo IPL matches, Swiggy’s ad recall increased by 62 per cent. The food delivery app saw 25 per cent growth in orders across India and 42 per cent spike in Google searches. The campaign also helped in uplifting the perception of the product proposition of fast delivery by 18 per cent.

    Swiggy ran a series of integrated campaigns throughout Vivo IPL season such as Match Day Mania, various TVCs and in-game innovation. Vivo IPL-themed advertisements explored relatable scenarios that have made Swiggy a household name today.

    “Many brands plan exclusive and relevant campaigns for IPL/cricket. This year too we will see the same. However given the reach of IPL as a platform, regular advertising works as well,” said Havas Media group CEO – India and South East Asia Anita Nayyar.

    "IPL with its undisputed reach and combination of cricket and entertainment is a zero risk property for brands. There have been many a brand launches using this platform over the years and brands earmark specific budgets for the event,” she added.

    Ogilvy, Madison, IPG, GroupM, DDB Mudra, Lowe Lintas, and Havas Media among others were some of the high-profile creative agencies that were a part of the Re.imagine awards last year.

    The 11th season of the cash-rich league enjoyed humungous reach both on TV and OTT platform of Star India.

    Building on the success of Vivo IPL 2018, the host broadcaster seems to be carving open more avenues for brands and marketers to collaborate for the latest edition.

    For instance, Star is putting together custom integrations and ad-tech solutions for television and digital respectively. This initiative of the broadcaster has been devised keeping in mind start-up companies that intend to use cricket as their preferred choice of vehicle for maximum impact.

    The American SuperBowl continues to remain one of the most awaited sporting leagues around the world from an advertising perspective. Agencies and brands create customised ads for the SuperBowl, spending millions of dollars on their campaigns to conjure up an iconic moment of marketing.

    In a conversation with Indiantelevision.com last year, Star Sports CEO Gautam Thakar had said, “In the US, as you know SuperBowl has been on for a long time and this has built-up. It is like high points of the year and there is a lot of social viewing and from the advertising perspective, people actually take pride in what they have created and are very expensive. Some of the ads only air at the time of SuperBowl and they spend millions of dollars doing that, but it breaks through the clutter and gets them virality.”

    Kapoor and Nayyar believe that Vivo IPL is the SuperBowl of India.

    “Besides being a big property, IPL is great for its very content. People do not watch IPL for ads but they will definitely watch our ads more because of the IPL. So it remains one of the most exciting platforms to land our brand messages,” Kapoor added.

    Thakar had pointed out that broadcasters can play a limited role but ultimately marketing professionals need to drive the agenda of matching the Vivo IPL advertising to the SuperBowl standard.

     “We had Re-imagine awards for IPL, it was the first time we were doing it but the idea behind that was to spur the marketing community to think of the IPL in a different way and create advertising for the IPL. We will do the awards every year now to showcase what is the best advertising. In our own little way we are trying to enable it but ultimately the marketers need to embrace it,” he added.

    As the 2019 Vivo IPL season inching closer by the day, Star India has announced the latest edition of the Re.imagine awards. The competition is bound to heat up as gurus and creative geniuses aim to deliver for cutting-edge, ground-breaking and pioneering campaigns. The audience can look forward to some unique and interesting campaigns this year as well in addition to the high-octane action on the field.

  • Star Sports launches #BabySitting campaign ahead of the Australia’s Tour of India

    Star Sports launches #BabySitting campaign ahead of the Australia’s Tour of India

    MUMBAI: Aptly setting the tone for a sensational ‘Summer of Cricket’ ahead, Star Sports, India has rolled out a TVC for the upcoming Paytm India v Australia ODI and T20 series. The highly anticipated five-match ODI and two T20 international matches starting February 24 will bring together two of crickets’ fiercest rivals pitted against each other. The film has been conceptualised by Taproot Dentsu.

    The on-ground banter in the recently concluded series between the two nations was lively and research conducted by Star Sports showed that it was spontaneously associated with the series. Riding on this banter, Taproot Dentsu has created two entertaining, topical films for the series with Virender Sehwag being the lead character talking about the campaign #BabySitting- Issbaar Kohli and team Australians ki babysitting karne ke liye hain taiyyar. A cheeky take on Tim Paine’s remark to Pant, these films play up the babysitting theme to pitch one team against the other.

    Star Sports CEO Gautam Thakar said, “The campaign amplifies the fun banter that all fans look forward to in every India vs Australia series. This series kicks off a “summer of cricket” on Star Sports including the VIVO IPL and the ICC World Cup. We are even more excited this year as we will now telecast this on our dedicated sports channels in Tamil, Telugu, and Kannada for our regional viewers apart from our existing English and Hindi feeds.”

    Speaking about the campaign, Taproot Dentsu CCO Santosh Padhi said, “Cricket banter gets a lot of attention in popular media and Paine’s remark has provided grist to our creative mill. The Aussies are good sports and we’ve used their dig against them, to set up a face-off between the two teams. A cheeky personality like Sehwag was an easy choice as the celebrity face for this campaign.”

    Campaign Links:

    YouTube:https://youtu.be/XD9EcP296_c

    Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/starsportsindia/videos/318741902104188/

    Twitter:https://twitter.com/StarSportsIndia/status/1094502571044204550

    Kohli led Team India will clash against the Aussies in the first ODI on February 24 in Visakhapatnam. With both teams working to finalise their core playing group in the run-up to the ICC Cricket World Cup 2019, this series plays an important role for both teams to identify their favourable playing XI.

    Star Sports will telecast the series LIVE in 5 languages – English, Hindi, Kannada, Tamil and Telugu and on Star Sports 1/HD, Star Sports 1 Hindi/HD, Star Sports 1 Kannada, Star Sports 1 Tamil and Star Sports 1 Telugu.

    Cricket fans can enjoy the action in their preferred language with detailed analytical commentary including the usage of graphics and augmented reality (AR) on the Select Dugout which will be available on Star Sports Select 1/HD for all the T20Is.

  • 2018’s most watch South Indian channels

    2018’s most watch South Indian channels

    BENGALURU: The South Indian television market is huge with a television penetration of about 95 percent. This paper is based on performance in terms of viewership –  and refers mainly to weekly impressions of top 5 channels in each of the four South Indian languages as per Broadcast Audience Research Council of India (BARC) data.

    The four major South India languages are (in order of populations of the major territories they are spoken in) Telugu in Andhra Pradesh/Telangana, Tamil in Tamil Nadu and Pondicherry, Kannada in Karnataka and Malayalam in Kerala. In terms of television households, Tamil Nadu leads because of its higher television penetration, followed by Andhra Pradesh/Telangana, Karnataka and Kerala in that order.

    Among the major networks, Star India, Sun TV Network, Viacom18/ETV and Zee Entertainment Enterprises Ltd (Zeel) have channels that cater to the viewership pleasure of speakers of at least three of the four languages.

    Here below is the performance of the top channels for each of the four languages.

    Kannada Channels

    There were four Kannada channels – three Kannada GECs and one Kannada movie channel that featured in BARC’s weekly list of top 5 Kannada channels for all the 52 weeks of 2018. Two channels were from the Sun TV Network and there was one channel each from Viacom18/ETV Network and Zeel. In alphabetical order, they were: Colors Kannada (Viacom18/ETV), Udaya Movies and Udaya TV (Sun TV Network) and Zee Kannada (Zeel).

    The most watched Kannada channels in terms of the sum of weekly impressions for all the 52 weeks of 2018 were – Colors Kannada, Zee Kannada, Udaya TV and Udaya Movies in that order.

    Colors Kannada was ranked no 1 in BARC’s list of top 5 Kannada channels during all the 52 weeks of 2018. The channel garnered a total of 21.997 billion impressions (Average weekly impressions 423.011 million) during the 52 weeks of 2018. At second place for each of the 52 weeks of 2018 was Zee Kannada. Zee Kannada scored a total of 17.825 billion impressions (average weekly impressions 342.787 million) during the 52 weeks of 2018. 

    The third-most watched channel in terms for total impressions was Udaya TV which had 11.362773 billion impressions Average weekly impressions 218.515 million) during the 52 weeks of 2018. Udaya TV was ranked third for 46 weeks and fourth for 6 weeks in BARC’s weekly list of top 5 Kannada channels during the 52 BARC weeks of 2018. The fourth most watched channel was Udaya Movies – the channel was ranked fourth for 44 weeks, third for six weeks and fifth for two weeks of 2018. Udaya Movies scored 10.164323 billion impressions Average weekly impressions195.468 million) during the 52 BARC weeks of 2018.

    Two other channels that featured in BARC’s weekly lists of five most watched Kannada channels were Star India’s Kannada GEC Star Suvarna and Viacom18/ETV’s HD channel – Colors Kannada HD. Star Suvarna was present in BARC’s Kannada channels list for 46 of the 52 week of 2018 and Colors Kannada was present for 6 of 52 weeks of 2018. Please refer to the figure below:

    Malayalam Channels

    Four Malayalam GECs made it consistently to BARC’s weekly lists of top 5 Malayalam channels during all the 52 weeks of 2018. These channels were from Star India, Insight Media City and Malayala Manorama (MM) TV and Sun TV. In alphabetical order they were: Asianet (Star India), Flowers TV, Mazhavil Manorama (Malayala Manorama (MM) TV) and Surya TV (Sun TV).

    In order of total impressions for all the 52 weeks of 2018, the channels are ranked as Asianet, Surya TV, Flowers TV and Mazhavil Manorama. 

    Asianet was ahead of the pack by far – it garnered 15.766 billion impressions during the year with a weekly average of 303.186 million impressions. It was always ranked 1 during all the 52 weeks of 2108. Surya TV was second with 5.134 billion impressions during the year and a weekly average of 98.73740385 million impressions. Flowers Media was ranked third with 4.919 billion impressions during the 52 weeks of 2018 and a weekly average of 94.587 million impressions. At fourth rank was Mazhavil Manorama which had 4.891 billion impressions for the year at a weekly average of 94.062 million impressions. 

    Please refer to the figure below for weekly trends for these channels.

    Tamil channels

    As in the case of Kannada and Malayalam, there were four Tamil channels that appeared in BARC’s weekly list of top 5 Tamil channels during all the 52 weeks of 2018. Three channels were GEC, while one was a Tamil movie channel. Two channels were from the Sun TV Network and there was one channel each from Star India and Zeel. The four channels, alphabetical order, were KTV, Star Vijay, Sun TV and Zee Tamil.

    Sun TV was by far the most watched Tamil GEC in 2018. The channel clocked a massive 48.490 billion impressions during 2018 with weekly average impressions of 932.508 million during the period. At second rank was Star India’s flagship Tamil GEC Star Vijay with 22.697 billion impressions during the 52 weeks of 2018 and a weekly average of 436.477 million. 

    At third rank was Zeel’s flagship Tamil GEC Zee Tamil with 21.948 billion impressions during the year and a weekly average of 422.080 million impressions. At fourth rank was the Sun TV Network’s Tamil movies channel KTV with 15.896 billion impressions during the year and a weekly average of 305.696 million impressions during the 52 BARC weeks of 2018. Please refer to the figure below.

    Telugu Channels

    Like the other three South Indian languages markets, there were 4 channels that were present consistently in BARC’s weekly list of top 5 Telugu channels during all the 52 weeks of 2018. All four were GECs spread over four different networks – Viacom18/ETV, Star India, Sun TV Network and Zeel.

    In alphabetical order, these channels were ETV Telugu (Viacom18/ETV), Gemini (Sun TV Network), Star Maa (Star India) and Zee Telugu (Zeel).

    Star Maa was the most watched Telugu channel in 2018 with 29.184 billion impressions during the year at a weekly average of 561.236 million. Zee Telugu was ranked second with 25.274 billion weekly impressions at a weekly average of 486.029 million. At third place was ETV Telugu with 23.435 billion impressions during the year at a weekly average of 450.682 million impressions during BARC’s 52 weeks of 2018. At fourth place was Gemini TV with 22.818 billion impressions at a weekly average of 438.804 million impressions.

    South India is an exciting place for television viewers today as broadcasters vie for attracting more and more sticky eyeballs to their fares. There are about 225 channels spread across the four South Indian languages that beam into India, besides many more that beam South Indian language content into other geographies. New channel launches, HD channel launches were the name of the game in 2018. Viacom18/ETV lunched its Tamil GEC – Colors Tamil in 2018, Zeel lunched a Malayalam channel in 2018 – both the pan-India networks wanted to mark their presence in these markets.

    Besides, Star India has been wooing sports viewers in South India -it now has 3 sports channels in South Indian languages – the last one to be launched near the end of 2018 – Star Sports 1 Kannada. Earlier, on 7 December, the network had launched Star Sports 1 Telugu to join Star Sports 1 Tamil. The launch of Star Sports 1 Kannada took the Star Sports channel count to 15 with 10 standard definition and five high definition channels.

    As many as nine HD channels were launched by two pan India networks in South India. Seven of the new HD channels were Telugu– five GEC and two movies and one each GEC HD channel was launched in Kannada and Malayalam. Network18 through Viacom18 and ETV launched five, while Zeel launched four HD channels. Zee Kannada HD was launched on 3 November 2018, while Zee Telugu HD and Zee Cinemalu HD were launched on 1 January 2018. Zee Keralam HD was launched on 5 December 2018.

    As is obvious from above, among the 4 languages, it was Sun TV that topped BARC’s weekly ratings in Tamil, Star Maa that generally topped the weekly ratings in Telugu, Colors Kannada that topped the ratings in Karnataka and Asianet that topped the ratings in Malayalam during 2018.

    BARC data for top10 channels across genres NCCS All India 2+ reveals that the Sun TV Networks flagship Tamil GEC Sun TV is the most watched channel in the country. In 2018, Sun TV headed BARC’s list of top 10 channels across genres for 48 of the 52 weeks of 2018.It was only during some weeks of the eleventh edition of the Indian cricketing bonanza IPL that channel lost its prime position in BARC’s list of top 10 channels across genres for four of the seven IPL weeks. Sun TV, one of the earliest players in the Indian television industry, has continued to dominate the Tamil television market despite the entry of national level big networks in the Tamil market. However, the Sun TV Network channels in the Kannada and Telugu markets had to concede numero uno status to national level players.

    With the entry of strong players such as Viacom18/ETV and Zeel, ratings could have a shakeup, especially in the Tamil and Malayalam language space. Over the next few years time will tell which player will top the ratings. In the meantime viewers will be spoiled for choice with quality content being beamed into their televisions.
     

  • Star Sports unveils new campaign “Cricket Ka Asli King Kaun” for India’s tour of New Zealand

    Star Sports unveils new campaign “Cricket Ka Asli King Kaun” for India’s tour of New Zealand

    MUMBAI: Star Sports – India’s leading sports broadcaster has unveiled a new campaign for India’s tour of New Zealand. The five-match ODI and three T20 international matches starting January 23 will bring together two of crickets’ most celebrated captains– Kane Williamson and Virat Kohli.

    Highlighting this interesting clash, the film conceptualised by Taproot India applauds the class and consistency of New Zealand captain Kane Williamson, who may be a King for fans in New Zealand but for Indian fans, “Cricket ka ek hi king hai” – King Kohli. The Blackcaps, given their 7-3 Win/Loss record at home in ODI series since 2015/16 represent a strong challenge for any visiting team. Furthermore, the New Zealand batsmen are in exceptional form as evidenced by the performance of Kane Williamson, Ross Taylor & Martin Guptill, who amassed 1054 runs in three innings against Sri Lanka, in the recently concluded ODI series. The pace bowling duo of Trent Boult and Tim Southee are also a force to recon with, especially in-home conditions. However, given India’s recent strong away performance against South Africa and Australia in ODIs, fans can look forward to an extremely competitive series between the two teams.

    As a result of the partnership between Star Sports and New Zealand Cricket, fans in India would be able to view both the ODIs and T20I matches at ease. For the first time, ODIs in New Zealand will start at 7 am IST and the T20Is at 12.30 pm IST on the Star Sports Network.

    Kohli led Team India will clash against the Blackcaps in the first ODI on January 23 in Napier. With both teams working to finalise their core playing group in the run-up to the ICC Cricket World Cup 2019, this series plays an important role for both captains, especially for India, with only 10 ODI games to be played by the team before the ICC Cricket World Cup.

    Star Sports will telecast the series LIVE in 5 languages – English, Hindi, Kannada, Tamil and Telugu and on Star Sports 1/HD, Star Sports 1 Hindi/HD, Star Sports 1 Kannada, Star Sports 1 Tamil and Star Sports 1 Kannada.

    Cricket fans can enjoy the action in their preferred language with detailed analytical commentary including the usage of graphics and augmented reality (AR) on the Select Dugout which will be available on Star Sports Select 1/HD for all the T20Is.

  • Sun continues to shine on its namesake broadcaster

    Sun continues to shine on its namesake broadcaster

    BENGALURU: Television penetration is high in South India about 95 per cent as compared to the national average of about 65 per cent. A little less than forty per cent of television viewership in India is from South India. According to a Sun TV Network investor presentation, the addressable television advertisement market for South Indian television broadcasters, which comprises national, regional and local level advertisers, is pegged at Rs 6,000 crore.

    The four major South Indian languages are (in order of populations of the major territories they are spoken in) Telugu in Andhra Pradesh/Telangana, Tamil in Tamil Nadu and Pondicherry, Kannada in Karnataka and Malayalam in Kerala. Besides, there is a global diaspora from South India that speaks one or more of these four languages. The largest regions in terms of population is Andhra Pradesh and Telangana combined, followed by Tamil Nadu, Karnataka and Kerala. In terms of television households, Tamil Nadu leads because of its higher television penetration, followed by Andhra Pradesh/Telangana, Karnataka and Kerala in that order. There are about 225 channels spread across the four South Indian languages that beam into India, besides many more that beam South Indian language content into other geographies.

    Networks, be they regional or pan-India, have been trying to attract as many eyeballs in these regions to their channels as they can. The focus in new channel launches seemed to be Telugu and to some extent Kannada in 2018. Though channels were launched in Tamil and Malayalam languages by major networks, it seemed more as efforts to enter these spaces, rather than to consolidate further.

    Among the major networks, Star India, Sun TV Network, Viacom18/ETV and Zee Entertainment Enterprises Ltd (Zeel) have channels that cater to the viewership pleasure of speakers of at least three of the four languages. All of them would like to lead in each of the four languages. The Sun TV Network has channels across genres such as GEC, movies, music, kids and comedy in all the four languages. The network also has news and ‘life’ channels in Tamil and Telugu.

    As things stood, until 2018, only Sun TV Network and Star India had major channels in all the four languages. Zeel launched its Malayalam GEC Zee Keralam on 19 November 2018 and completed its quartet. The network had catered to only the Telugu, Tamil and Kannada audiences until then. With the launch of Zee Keralam, Zeel had five channels for South Indian viewers – Zee Telugu, Zee Kannada, Zee Tamil and Zee Cinemalu, a Telugu Movies channel.

    The major GECs from the Star India stable included Asianet for Malayalam, Star Vijay for Tamil, Star Suvarana for Kannada and Star Maa for Telugu. Besides, Star India has been wooing sports viewers in South India -it now has 3 sports channels in South Indian languages – the last one to be launched near the end of 2018 – Star Sports 1 Kannada. Earlier, on December 7, the network had launched Star Sports 1 Telugu to join Star Sports 1 Tamil. The launch of Star Sports 1 Kannada took the Star Sports channel count to 15 with 10 standard definition and five high definition channels.

    Another national network, Network18, through Viacom 18 and ETV, has also been making rapid strides to catch up with its peers in the South Indian space. Earlier in the year, on February 19, Viacom 18 Media Pvt Ltd (Viacom 18) had launched Colors Tamil. The company followed it up by launching a Kannada movies channels – Colors Kannada Cinema. Viacom 18 also started the Kannada feed of two of its kids’ channels – Nickelodeon and Nickelodeon Sonic. Through the ETV brand, the Network 18 group launched ETV Pus HD, ETV Life HD and ETV Aburichi HD, ETV Cinema HD were launched on December 27, 2018.

    As many as nine HD channels were launched by two pan India networks in South India. Seven of the new HD channels were Telugu– five GEC and two movies and one each GEC HD channel was launched in Kannada and Malayalam. Network 18 through Viacom 18 and ETV launched five, while Zeel launched four HD channels. Zee Kannada HD was launched on 3 November 2018, while Zee Telugu HD and Zee Cinemalu HD were launched on 1 January 2018. Zee Keralam HD was launched on 5 December 2018.

    2018 saw elections in a number of states in the country. It also saw launch of regional news channels in the south. NewsX Kannada, a Kannada news channel was launched in 2018, while in the Telugu News space, Thota Chandrasekhar who holds positions in actor-politician Pawan Kalyan’s Jana Sena Party, launched 99 TV on 11 July, 2018. The Jana Sena Party also reportedly supports another Telugu News channel that started test runs on 24 October 2018 -Prime9 News.

    According to a Broadcast Audience Research Council of India (BARC) presentation in April 2018, television viewership in 2017 grew by 32 per cent as compared to 2016. In South India, viewership of Kannada content led the growth, followed by Telugu, Tamil and Malayalam with 63 per cent, 33 per cent, 30 per cent and 16 per cent growth respectively. Comparatively, viewership of the largest language – Hindi, grew by 27 per cent.

    The Sun continues to shine on Sun TV

    BARC data for top 10 channels across genres NCCS All India 2+ reveals that the Sun TVv Networks flagship Tamil GEC Sun TV is the most watched channel in the country. In 2018, Sun TV headed BARC’s list of top 10 channels across genres for 48 of the 52 weeks of 2018. It was only during some weeks of the eleventh edition of the Indian cricketing bonanza IPL that channel lost its prime position in BARC’s list of top 10 channels across genres for four of the seven IPL weeks.

    Among the 4 languages, it was Sun TV that topped BARC’s weekly ratings in Tamil, Star Maa that generally topped the weekly ratings in Telugu, Colors Kannada that topped the ratings in Karnataka and Asianet that topped the ratings in Malayalam during 2018.

    Since week 1 of 2018, BARC has also started putting in the public domain weekly ratings of news channels in these languages – and there are more than forty of them spread across the four languages. Polimer News in Tamil, TV9 Telugu in Telugu, TV9 Kannada, and Asianet News in Malayalam were the regional news toppers according to BARC’s weekly list of top 5 news channels in each respective language during 2018.

    From the financial aspect, the Sun TV Network has been one of the most profitable media and entertainment companies in India. The company has been rewarding its shareholders with dividends for at least three of the four quarters of a fiscal. Financial year 2018-19 or FY 2018-19 (period between 01 April 2018 to 31 March 2019) seems to be no different – the company has already rewarded its shareholders with dividends for the two quarters for which it has declared results so far.

    Despite not having a number 1 position in BARC’s weekly lists of top 5 channels in Telugu, Kannada and Malayalam, the network’s channels have a huge combined viewership. The company claims in his investor presentation that about 29 per cent of the estimated Rs 4,500 crore television ad revenue and 60 per cent of subscription revenue of the four South Indian spaces accrues to it. The Sun TV Network’s revenue for FY 2018-19 was Rs 2,862 crore, profit after tax (PAT) was Rs 979 crore (36 per cent margin). Sun TV Network’s ad and subscription revenues for fiscal 2018-19 were Rs 1,172 crore and Rs 1,116 crore respectively.

  • Star India awaits cricket bonanza in 2019 after solid sports growth in 2018

    Star India awaits cricket bonanza in 2019 after solid sports growth in 2018

    MUMBAI: Uday Shankar, who was recently promoted to president of The Walt Disney Company Asia Pacific and chairman of Star and Disney India after the Fox-Disney units combined, has disrupted the Indian sports broadcasting business in the last couple of years. From scooping the media rights of the cash-rich Indian Premier League (IPL) to bolstering his sports networks’ regional offerings with the launch of Telugu and Kannada language, Shankar has thrown caution to the wind on more than one occasion in his bid to change the rules of the high-stakes game. Shankar’s grand vision and appetite for big bets has now placed Star India in a rather enviable position with a stranglehold over cricket properties this World Cup year.

    Tightened grip on Indian cricket

    Star wasted no time in setting the tone for the year as it appointed Gautam Thakar as the new Star Sports CEO on 15 January 2018. Thakar was roped in to fill up the void left by the exit of Nitin Kukreja, Shankar’s blue-eyed boy, who left the organisation in March 2017.

    The broadcaster tried to alter the IPL timings (8 pm game to 7 pm and the 4 pm match to 5.30 pm), a controversial development which was confirmed to Indiantelevision.com by then IPL chairman Rajeev Shukla. Despite the IPL governing council on board with the idea, opposition from team owners stalled Star’s plans.

    In February, Star won the rights for IPL’s audio-visual production as well as the BCCI domestic circuit for 2018-19, further tightening its grip on Indian cricket.

    In April, Star kept its foot on the pedal as it retained the BCCI rights, conducted via an e-auction for the first time, until 2023 for mind-boggling Rs 6,138.1 crore. Star came out on top after a fierce bidding war, which lasted three days, against Sony Pictures Network India (SPNI).

    The broadcaster paid Rs 60.1 crore per match for the 2018-23 home rights across five years which, a 50 per cent increase from the Rs 40.1 crore it shelled out for the 2012-18 cycle with a bid of Rs 3,851 crore for 96 matches.

    Kicked off IPL with a bang

    Star couldn’t have asked for a better start to its IPL reign, firing on all cylinders. The IPL final, aired live on 17 channels across eight different languages, powered the network’s growth by 34 per cent with 52.9 million average impressions. The title decider was produced with 11 live feeds across the TV network and Hotstar.

    Super streamer Hotstar, then led by Ajit Mohan, hit a world record for concurrent online viewing with 10.7 million viewers for the final. The final witnessed a sudden hike from eight million to 9.1 million and then to 9.7 million before hitting the 10.7 million mark.

    The television viewership for the tournament was 1.4 billion impressions with a growth of 15 per cent. With a total of six regional languages contributed to 22 per cent of the overall viewership.

    According to industry sources, the network clocked close to Rs 2000 crore in advertising revenue for the first season.

    For the first time, IPL was also aired on public broadcaster Doordarshan. According to the agreement, Doordarshan could telecast a select number of matches with a 60-minute delay along with some highlights.

    Another potential Star-Prasar Bharti face-off

    It wasn’t all smooth sailing for the broadcaster. In October, MIB proposed to amend the Sports Act 2007, which will provide ‘sports events of national importance’ on Prasar Bharati-owned, free-to-air Doordarshan Network an extended reach via private direct to home and cable TV Networks.

    The MIB has now proposed to amend the act to make such events available on DD through all mediums of distribution. This may result in preference changes of the consumer and would not subscribe to costly private sports network channels. This will also give the distribution platforms an opportunity to negotiate harder with the sports broadcasters.

    The move to amend the Sports Act 2007 has been necessitated due to a Supreme Court verdict which held that the public broadcaster Doordarshan cannot air events of national importance on private distribution platforms.

    In the same month, MIB issued a notice for receiving feedback/comments from general public/stakeholders on the draft bill, 2018. In a recent update, the ministry has extended the deadline to give feedback on the draft sports broadcasting signals (Mandatory sharing with Prasar Bharti) (Amendment) Bill 2018 till 15 January 2019. The earlier deadline was 31 December 2018.

    A move of this nature could adversely impact the revenues of sports broadcasters, particularly Star given its big bets on Indian cricket.

    Bolstered regional play

    Star India launched three channels in 2018, in line with its commitment of fostering a multi-sports culture in the country. Star Sports 3, a multi-lingual channel, was launched on 15 September and the first big event to air on it was Indian Super League (ISL) Season 5 in Hindi.

    Star Sports launched its third regional channel Star Sports 1 Telugu after Star Sports 1 Hindi and Star Sports 1 Tamil. The channel went on-air on 7 December.

    The broadcaster added a fourth regional channel, Star Sports 1 Kannada, on 29 December. Star India’s attempt at securing an exclusive sports channel for its Kannada viewers didn’t see the light of day for the 11th season of IPL. Regulatory hurdles made the broadcaster switch the Kannada feed to Suvarna Plus.

    According to FICCI- Re-imagining India’s M&E sector 2018, the sale of broadcasting and media rights is the biggest source of revenue for most sports organisations, and can account for 55 per cent to 70 per cent of total revenues. The global sports media rights is expected to breach the US$50 billion barrier in 2019 and could reach US$54.3 billion by 2021.

    2019 cricket bonanza

    2019 is loaded with marquee cricket events with Star India owning rights to most of them. The summer has four key series or tournaments – New Zealand versus India, India versus Australia followed by the 2019 IPL and the all-important ICC World Cup 2019. Barring two series, Star is bound to be the home for Indian cricket lovers this year. That’s not all. The broadcaster intends to further dominate the regional language market play with the launch of three additional sports channels in Bengali, Marathi and Malayalam. 

  • Tata Communications and NEP pioneer the remote production of VIVO Pro Kabbadi League 2018 for Star Sports

    Tata Communications and NEP pioneer the remote production of VIVO Pro Kabbadi League 2018 for Star Sports

    MUMBAI: Tata Communications, a leading global digital infrastructure provider, and NEP Broadcast Solutions, a division of NEP Group, are together enabling the remote production of  VIVO Pro Kabbadi League (PKL) for Star Sports, the number one sports broadcaster in India and subsidiary of  21st Century Fox. Now in its sixth season, this is the first time that PKL is being produced remotely by harnessing superfast connectivity.

    The PKL is the largest league in the nation in terms of footprint, and the second most popular sports league in terms of viewership after the Indian Premier League (IPL). The 2018 season consists of 138 matches taking place over 91 days (October 7th 2018 – January 5th 2019). It is being streamed across six channels and in five languages – Star Sports English, Star Sports Hindi, Star Sports First, Star Sports 1 (Tamil), Star Suvarna Plus (Kannada) and Star Maa Gold (Telugu).

    Given the back-to-back schedule of events in multiple locations, Star Sports has partnered with Tata Communications and NEP to streamline and reduce the cost of the broadcast of PKL with remote production.

    This means that production teams don’t need to travel to each venue, and the different localised broadcasts can be brought to audiences more efficiently.

    During each match, the remote production team (the director, vision mixer, audio engineers, EVS operators, producers and graphics team) operates out of the Star Sports facility in Mumbai, whereas the production crew along with NEP’s engineering team (cameramen, sound assistants, talent producers and the production management) are on-site. They collaborate seamlessly in real-time to deliver every moment of the action to more than 200 million viewers using Tata Communications’  Video Connect network. It ensures the smooth transmission of a combination of signals and camera feeds from each fixture because of its ultra-low, four- frames-per-second latency and hitless switching capability. NEP’s flight pack Broadcast Lite – which allows a quick set-up in minimum space without any compromise in functionality and quality – makes it easy for Star Sports to produce both the world feed and regional language feeds. These consist of 27 unilateral camera feeds that are sent from the venues to its Mumbai hub, and 4 return feeds that are sent back to the venues, along with associated AES audio feeds.

    “As India’s number one sports broadcaster, we have always pushed the boundaries of what’s possible,” a Star India spokesperson said. “Harnessing the joint capabilities of NEP and Tata Communications allows us to bring this incredible — yet logistically complex — series of matches to millions of Kabaddi fans across India without a glitch. And, thanks to the efficiencies gained through remote production, we can focus our efforts on enhancing how people are able to enjoy and engage with their favourite sport.”

    “The millions of kabaddi fans across India don’t want to miss a millisecond of the on or off-court action, which means that the production of each PKL match needs to be completely seamless,” said Brian Morris, Vice President and General Manager, Media & Entertainment Services, Tata Communications. “At the same time, broadcasters are under pressure to increase efficiencies and reduce costs to ensure good return for their sports investments. To deliver the highest-quality content to audiences and create a TV experience that is closest to witnessing a match live in the stadium, more and more broadcasters globally are following in Star Sports’ footsteps and embracing remote production.”

    “We are delighted to partner again with Star Sports and Tata Communications on enhancing the viewer experience by seamlessly broadcasting sporting events to millions of fans using remote production. This teamwork demonstrates that leveraging the unified force of leading organisations can drive innovation in the broadcasting industry while improving efficiencies,” said Saeed Izadi, President, Broadcast Solutions, NEP. “Together, we are redefining the production of kabaddi in India.”

    In less than a year, this is Star Sports’ second major remote production project with Tata Communications and NEP. Earlier this year, the two companies joined forces for the remote production of the entire VIVO IPL 2018 league that consisted of 60 matches taking place over 50 days in nine cities.

  • Star Sports to telecast AFC Asian Cup UAE 2019 in six languages

    Star Sports to telecast AFC Asian Cup UAE 2019 in six languages

    MUMBAI: The year 2019 kicks-off in style for all the football fans in India as Team India – Blue Tigers gear up to battle for supremacy in Asia’s most prized football tournament – AFC Asian Cup. To add to the fans’ excitement, Star Sports, the official broadcaster of AFC Asian Cup UAE 2019 will telecast all the India games in English, Hindi, Tamil, Bengali, Kannada and Malayalam to ensure fans get an opportunity to cheer for their team in their preferred language. This will be the first time Team India – Blue Tigers’ participation in a major international tournament will be telecast in six languages.

    Keeping fans at the heart of the experience, Star Sports’ broadcast of the AFC Asian Cup UAE 2019 will include an immersive, 360-degree coverage of the Blue Tigers. The broadcast offers fans the best of football action on and off the field, extensive commentary from football experts across languages and special programming for the Blue Pilgrims.

    Star Sports broadcast of AFC Asian Cup UAE 2019 will include previews, reviews and extensive analysis of all the games played throughout the tournament. These insights will be shared by some of the best football experts in the world, both from the venue as well as from specially designed in-house studios for the tournament. Legendary football commentator John Helm will be accompanied by Paul Masefield for commentary from the venue. These experts will be joined by India’s AFC Asian Cup 2011 squad members Renedy Singh and Mehrajuddin Wadoo as they share their expert opinions during the English broadcast from the in-house studios.

    The first ever broadcast of a major football tournament involving India in six languages will also include a host of language experts lending their voice for the broadcast involving all India games. Raman Vijayan in Tamil, Jo Paul Ancheri in Malayalam, and Debjit Ghosh & Rajat Ghosh Dastidar in Bengali along with NS Manju (Kannada) who represented India in AFC Asian Cup 2011 will be a part of the Star Sports broadcast plans for AFC Asian Cup UAE 2019.

    The Indian national football team has seen a massive growth in support on the back of some strong performances at the international stage, which saw India breaking into the top 100 in FIFA rankings and hosting major international tournaments such as the FIFA U-17 World Cup India 2017, Hero Intercontinental Cup and other international games.

    Blue Tigers will look to overcome challenges from hosts UAE, Bahrain and Thailand in the group stage in order to advance to the Round of 16 – a feat they have achieved only once in the history of the tournament in 1964, when the team ended as the runners up of the tournament.

    Star Sports will telecast all the games from the tournament LIVE on Star Sports 3, with LIVE telecast of India games in six languages across Star Sports network and Hotstar.

    India are grouped with hosts UAE, Thailand and Bahrain in Group A. Team India will play their first game against Thailand on Sunday, January 06, 2019.

  • Star India moves Basant Dhawan from sports to entertainment biz

    Star India moves Basant Dhawan from sports to entertainment biz

    MUMBAI: Star Sports senior VP, brand solutions and sponsorships Basant Dhawan has been shifted to entertainment business by the group. He will be working as national agency head, which will contribute to the growth of the entertainment ad sales business.

    His earlier role included product and revenue strategy and sales functions. He was responsible for creating pricing and revenue assets, product packages along with sales for all new sports leagues that Star has been associated with, including Pro Kabaddi League (PKL), football leagues and Premier Badminton League (PBL). 

    Prior to Star India, Dhawan was the general manager-media in Vodafone India services. He has worked with auto, telecom, media and entertainment industries in his career.

    With over 25 years of experience, Dhawan is a result oriented marketing and business professional. His expertise lies in direct sales, distribution, product management, brand marketing media planning and buying to name a few.

    He started his career with Escotel as manager marketing and then moved to Airtel’s Landline business, Touchtel as corporate sales manager after 4 years. He has also worked with Reliance communication, Reliance Infocomm, Bharti Aitel and Aircel.

    In 2018, Star India launched two channels expanding its sports cluster named Star Sports 3 and Star Sports 1 Telugu. Star Sports 1 Kannada is also being tested and will launch before New Year.

    Under the new tariff order, Star Sports 1 Kannada (30 December) and Star Sports 1 Telugu (7 December) have been priced at Rs 19 for TV consumers.

  • Star Sports curates a special line up of programming shows for VIVO IPL 2019 Player Auction

    Star Sports curates a special line up of programming shows for VIVO IPL 2019 Player Auction

    Mumbai: The forthcoming VIVO IPL 2019 Player Auction promises to be an unparalleled spectacle with Star Sports, the official broadcaster of the tournament geared up with a special line up of programming shows for all the cricket fans across the country. 

    VIVO IPL 2019 Player Auction will be held in Jaipur on Tuesday, December 18, 2018. The live coverage of the auction will be preceded by a 60-minute special pre-show starting 2.30 pm onwards. 

    The broadcast of the 12th edition of the VIVO IPL Player Auction on Star Sports will include live expert reactions, analysis and a special spotlight on all the leading developments throughout the day featuring some of the best cricket experts such as Gautam Gambhir, David Hussey, Dean Jones, Kiran More, etc.

    Besides the robust programming, Star Sports launched the second edition of the hugely popular VIVO IPL Election Se Selection as a lead up to the VIVO IPL 2019 Player Auction.  VIVO IPL Election Se Selection offers fans an opportunity to vote for their favourite player they wish see playing in their favourite VIVO IPL team. The largely popular campaign has received massive response so far with more than 3.1 million fans voting on the official portal  vivoiplelection.hotstar.com.

    Fans can vote for their player till midnight December 17, 2018 team in three easy steps by logging on to vivoiplelection.hotstar.com

    • Select your favourite team
    • Choose your player
    • Complete the voting process  

    Yuvraj Singh and Brendon McCullum are the most voted players overall so far: 

    Whereas, Chennai Super Kings, Delhi Capitals and Kings XI Punjab fans have voted the most: 

    VIVO IPL 2019 Player Auction received an overwhelming response from fans and was viewed by a 46.5 million people across the Star Sports network.

     List of experts:

    Hindi: Gautam Gambhir Kiran More and RP Singh

    Select Dugout (English): Dean Jones, Anil Kumble and David Hussey

    Tamil: Hemang Badani, S Badrinath, L Siva, Muthuraman R and RK

    Telugu: C Venkatesh, Kalyan Krishna, Vindhya Vishaka and Venugopal Rao

    Anchors: Mayanti Langer, Jatin Sapru and Arjun Pandit