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Javed Farooqui (THE ECONOMIC TIMES; December 8, 2022)

Mumbai: Leading over-the-top (OTT) platforms are continuing to invest heavily in original content production, buoyed by an expansion in audience base and strong growth in content consumption. According to market estimates, top OTT players have spent between $600 million and $700 million on producing original shows in 2022.

This amount excludes movie and sports content which account for a significant chunk of the OTT content expenditure. Amazon Prime Video, Netflix and Disney+ Hotstar are the top spenders on original content productions, followed by platforms like Sony LIV, ZEE5 and Voot.

In 2019 and 2020, Netflix spent $400 million on content, including on movies. In April, Amazon Prime stated that it will double down on content investments in India with plans to launch more than 40 new titles across series and movies in Hindi, Tamil and Telugu. The platform's content plans are on track.

According to industry watchers, OTT platforms are expected to increase their content spending to fuel their business growth, notwithstanding the fact that revenues are under pressure due to inflation and a global economic slowdown.

“The content creation cycle for OTTs is very long and most of the projects to be delivered in 2023 are already at different stages of production. The investment in content will continue to increase as the OTT market expands and users increase their consumption because of better connectivity and increasing sales of connected TV,” said Uday Sodhi, partner at Founder's Room Capital.

Sony LIV, which has tasted success with original shows in recent years, is upbeat about the year ahead. “We are very bullish on our original content plans and we have a lot of big launches coming up in 2023. We are also dialling up on the originals space in regional languages,” said Saugata Mukherjee, its head of content.

As per Media Partners Asia estimates, the online video content investment in India stood at $1.3 billion in 2022 and is projected to increase to $4.2 billion by 2027.

"Since 2019 the contribution of online video to total content investments for the industry, including television and films has almost doubled. For 2022, online video grew 18% Y/Y to reach $1.3 billion, as domestic and global streaming majors invested heavily to bulk up their local content offerings. Over the next five years, these investments will scale further to $4.2 billion, to catch up with pay-TV," said Mihir Shah, Vice President of MPA.

‘India has Over 130 m Paying Subscribers’
Mumbai: The Indian over-the-top (OTT) market has 130.2 million paying (SVOD or subscription voice on demand) audiences compared to 110.5 million in 2021, media consulting firm Ormax Media has said in its latest study titled The Ormax OTT Audience Sizing Report 2022. The total SVOD base has expanded by 18%. The direct SVOD subscriber base stood at 49 million, while the indirect SVOD subscriber base came in at 81.2 million. Over 2021, direct and indirect SVOD subscribers will have grown by 19% and 16%, respectively. The study also reveals that there are 119 million active paid OTT subscriptions in India., which translates to an average of 2.4 subscriptions per paying audience member. — ET Bureau