Showing posts with label Eros Now. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Eros Now. Show all posts
Red-hot OTT market likely to enter consolidation phase
8:52 AM
Javed Farooqui (THE ECONOMIC TIMES; March 28, 2024)
Mumbai: India's booming streaming market, which includes more than 50 OTT video entertainment platforms, is ripe for consolidation as large players look for new growth opportunities and smaller ones crave for fresh funds to survive, say industry experts.
Despite incurring losses, deep-pocketed OTT platforms are continuing operations due to regular fund injections from their parent companies, while smaller rivals are at risk of going out of business due to high capital requirements for content, marketing, and user acquisition, they said.
The small OTT platforms are hence facing two options: get acquired by larger platforms or shut shop due to growing losses as expenses continue to outpace revenues.
Zee Entertainment chief Punit Goenka said consolidation in the OTT industry has to happen since the market can accommodate only a certain number of players. As per Media Partners Asia, India's OTT video market, which generated $3 billion in 2022, is projected to more than double to nearly $7 billion by 2027. "An average subscriber is subscribing to 2.5 OTTs, so from that perspective, consolidation has to happen. It will be either consolidation or some platforms will have to shut shop," Goenka told ET in a recent interview.
Streaming in India continues to be a cash-guzzling business due to high content costs coupled with monetization challenges. India is a price-sensitive market featuring the lowest average revenue per user (ARPU) of $7.2, according to RBSA Advisors, making monetization through subscriptions a challenging task.
Though OTT platforms have made progress in monetizing through advertising, YouTube continues to be the dominant player in the ₹13,000-crore digital video ad market.
The merger of Star India and Viacom18 will make the proposed merged entity a powerful force to be reckoned with in the OTT industry, with two strong platforms in Disney+ Hotstar and Jio Cinema with 333 million and 95 million monthly active users, respectively, for Q4 2023, according to Sensor Tower.
People privy to the developments said South Indian streaming platform AHA is scouting for funds as it needs investments to grow the business. The company has held talks with multiple parties but hasn't been able to any headway so far. Despite recording strong growth, Bengali OTT platform Hoichoi has seen its net worth erode due to accumulated losses of up to Rs. 28 crore, as of March 2023. Balaji Telefilms-owned ALTT and Eros International-owned Eros Now have scaled down their operations due to intense competition.
ZEE5 had recorded cumulative losses of over Rs. 800 crore in 9M FY24. Novi Digital Entertainment, which owns Disney+ Hotstar, incurred a Rs. 748-crore loss in FY23.
Media industry expert Rajesh Sethi believes that consolidation will create a smarter content ecosystem and provide hyperscale revenue opportunities, leading to sustainable profitability. "Most OTT platforms are unprofitable, despite their widespread adoption and borderless consumption. The streaming industry will be shaped by consolidation to achieve competitive scale and efficiency. OTT platforms desirous of a national play will need to provide content in 8 to 10 languages, and each language will further require multiple pieces of fresh content across films and series, which can be achieved by consolidation," said Sethi.
According to Studio Mojo founder Radhakrishnan Ramachandran, the Indian OTT market will witness consolidation since smaller players will find it difficult to match up to the financial might of Disney+ Hotstar-Jio Cinema, Netflix and Amazon Prime Video in the new competitive scenario.
Haathi Mere Saathi’s Hindi version to now directly premiere on television
4:31 PM
Uma Ramasubramanian (MID-DAY; September 4, 2021)
It has been a long wait for Rana Daggubati to see Haathi Mere Saathi on the big screen. The multilingual, originally slated for an April 2020 release, had to be postponed to January 2021 due to the pandemic. In January, the makers announced that the drama was further pushed to March. Fortunately, Kaadan and Aranya — the Tamil and Telugu versions of the film respectively — had a big-screen release in south India on March 26. However, the Hindi version could not keep its date with the audience as the number of Coronavirus cases had risen in Maharashtra, Punjab and other states, which serve as crucial markets for Hindi releases.
Now, director Prabhu Solomon and the producers are pursuing a direct-to-television premiere. The Hindi version will premiere on Zee Cinema on September 18 and stream on Eros Now. “Through Haathi Mere Saathi, I wanted to put across a thought that could ignite conversations around the cause of protecting elephants and nature,” says the director.
The film focuses on the issue of human encroachment in elephant corridors. Daggubati is glad that the story will reach viewers across the country. “It is a journey of a man who is best friends with elephants and their protector. It is an important story that needs to be told.”
Eros Now called out for non-payment of dues; CEO denies claims
8:16 AM
After Eros COO Shikha Kapur and team walk out of the company, ex-employees accuse production house of withholding F&F settlement; CEO denies claims even as he admits that studio is badly hit by the pandemic
Mohar Basu (MID-DAY; June 25, 2021)
Last week, it was reported that Shikha Kapur, COO, Eros International, stepped down from her position, putting an abrupt end to her year-long stint at the organisation. Almost 20 members have exited the production house in the past few months, some along with her, giving credence to the industry buzz that the organisation has been defaulting in its payment of salaries and dues. Shortly after, several former employees took to social media to call out the company for its non-payment of dues.
A senior employee, who left the Kishore Lulla-led organisation this month, says the monetary constraints began well before the Coronavirus pandemic. “The management has been callous. The place doesn’t feel aligned to my value system. The employees are not cared for and the lockdown resulted in an emotional shift. People have not left because of money. They left because they were suffocated. There are angry employees in every corner of the company. Movie making is a collaborative process where if vendors are not being paid measly amounts like 25k and 1 lac, they wouldn’t want to work with you again. These monies haven’t been cleared in years and Eros believes they can get away with it because no one flags it off.”
The ex-employee adds that following Eros’s merger with STX Entertainment in 2020, one assumed the company would be on firm ground. “Their issues are functional. And they have a tendency of not paying people. Last year, they hadn’t cleared a vendor’s dues, he made a big noise about it after which it was cleared. Why do we need to do andolan to get what's due? They say things like, 'It’s only one month’s money, why are you asking for it?' There is a lack of compassionate leadership. My biggest concern was for small vendors who were constantly told by the finance department why are you following up. They are too small in the system to protest because they fear not getting work in the future."
Another senior resource who left late last year informs us, “This has been happening routinely for the last few years. People keep leaving because there is an ethical issue more than a financial one. But their outlook on business is flawed. Eros Now had the first mover advantage but the platform could never capitalise. They keep bluffing their numbers on releases. Old collaborators are backing out because they are given lopsided deals. What happened with Shikha Kapur’s team has been happening to people for more than a year. Manav Sethi, the former COO too, had to go through a lot to get his full and final salary from the company. Eros also keeps senior employees at arm’s length and this lack of transparency issue is troubling.”
Another senior leader from the creative team, who quit in mid-2020, rues that he has not been given his year-end bonus. “Salaries would come late, which can be attributed to the pandemic. Letting people go can be justified, but how do you explain not paying dues? They are a listed company. I left in the initial days of the lockdown because they owed me certain money in January 2020. Taking into account the bonus and the full-and-final settlement, they owe me close to Rs. 60 lakh,” he says.
A vendor, who worked on media sales with Eros, says that the company hasn’t cleared his dues of close to Rs 10 lakh since 2019. However, two current employees confirmed that they are paid timely salaries, while Kapur and her team were also given their monthly dues.
Founded in 1977, the production and distribution company has backed several films, including Manmarziyaan (2018), Shubh Mangal Saavdhan (2017) and Bajirao Mastani (2015). It also launched its movie-on-demand vertical, Eros Now, in 2012.
When mid-day reached out to Eros, Pradeep Dwivedi, CEO, said that the studio was “doubly hit” by the lockdown. “We had 7 films on floors and everything came to a standstill. Theatrical shutdown impacted us heavily too. Significant constraints and stresses have been in our business. We have had to take some harsh steps to manage the situation. Unlike most companies, we did not cut salaries in the last one and half years. In turn, we have decided to move away from theatrical productions to develop content for OTT. OTT offerings are drastically different in its making than large format films. After wave 2, we have been left shaken. The business model is rejigged; requesting former people to resign or terminate their services after they have been found redundant in the current scheme of things. For all people laid off, complete salaries have been paid to them or are under process. Existing employees could face some delayed salaries, because of vendor payment delays. But former employees have all been paid in full.”
Dwivedi emphasises that the studio suffered huge financial losses after Haathi Mere Saathi that was released in Tamil, Telugu and Hindi but couldn’t have a run due to the theatre lockdown in March.
Reiterating that the payments could also be pending due to logistical delays if the employee hasn’t returned company items like access data cards, critical documents et al. “Once all the handover has been completed, it takes 90 days for finance to clear their amounts which we assure we will for every employee past and present.”
We specifically ask him about the non-payment of bonus amounts as cited by an employee earlier in the copy, to which Dwivedi says, “Some employees leave unhappy. A particular senior management employee left on a bad note and that’s where the non-payment of bonus amounts is coming from. As of July last year, he signed a letter saying he was duly paid by the company. He has withdrawn claims to bonus and ESOPs in his full and final settlement. He had sent us a legal notice to which we have responded. We are initiating legal action on the said employee for defamation (referring to his tweets) to move against the said employee. He is indulging in social media extortion.”
Addressing rumours of lack of vendor payments, he says, “It is a chain reaction. From the time the pandemic started till now, we had not let go of a single person till now. The fact that we have paid everyone internal, some external payments were delayed. Creative process getting hampered due to cash flow delay is possible. There are some long delays too. Some occasions it was a case of work not being completed. The monies being owed to us from distributors, theatre chains because there is no money in the market. The stress is on the economy and it’s not fair to single us out.”
The year OTT emerged as the biggest winner
8:25 AM
Juhi Chakraborty (HINDUSTAN TIMES; December 31, 2020)
The pandemic and the resulting Coronavirus lockdown played a crucial role in scaling up content consumption in the OTT space. The lockdown phase acted as a catalyst in shifting content availability to digital, based on the evolving consumption habits of the viewer who is now constantly available on digital touch points, converting fence-sitters to subscribers.
“One of the major content consumption trends we’ve seen this year is that earlier 60% of our consumers would come from the top tier 1 cities, and 40% would come from tier 2 and 3 in the months preceding the lockdown. Now it’s the opposite,” notes Nachiket Pantvaidya, CEO, ALT Balaji and group COO, Balaji Telefilms.
In addition, the audience mindset has drastically changed, with the desire to pay for quality content. This is bound to create large audience pools whether for original content, movies, music, news, games or sports.
“It redefined entertainment in the sense that it made cinema accessible to people in a very difficult year. The OTT industry has challenged us also to think outside the box, think of narratives that push creative boundaries,” shares producer Anand Pandit, whose film The Big Bull is headed to the web.
In terms of viewership, business, subscription, and acquisition of projects for the platforms, there has been a massive change this year for digital platforms. “Our active subscription grew 2.6 times versus November 2019. Our engagement grew 1.3 times and average subscription grew three times. The preferred language was Hindi, followed by Telugu. The preferred genre was crime and thriller,” a ZEE5 spokesperson shared.
Consumers had been used to one kind of entertainment habit — going to the theatre for a weekend movie and/or sitting in front of TV. But when fresh content stopped coming to the TV and theatres shut for months, it broke the inertia about OTT. “We posted a growth of 6.9 million paid subscribers which is the largest six-month growth for us ever,” says Ali Hussein, CEO, Eros Now India.
Ferzad Palia, head of Voot Select, Youth, Music and English Entertainment, Viacom18, says, “Even after lockdown was lifted, we see good growth across the board, both ad supported business and subscription business. We also shot and created the world’s first full-blown series from home — The Gone Game.” Based on these positive trends, it will be interesting to see if this growth trajectory will continue in the future as well.
Amid Coronavirus outbreak, OTT comes to the rescue
8:38 AM
As most of us are self-quarantining due to the Coronavirus outbreak, digital shows and OTT platforms have turned to be our sole entertainers
Juhi Chakraborty and Rishabh Suri (HINDUSTAN TIMES; March 25, 2020)
Staying in is what most of us are doing amid this pandemic situation. And naturally, the more we stay at home, the more we find ourselves glued to the screens. Now, with no film releases in sight because of the shutdown of theatres and shoot of TV shows stalled across the country, what everyone is finding solace in are the OTT platforms. In fact, web shows have become the best tool for people to ward off boredom, and the platforms, too, are ensuring that the audience is spoilt for choice.
RISE IN TRAFFIC
The web, in times of no new films or TV shows, has seen a drastic spike in their traffic. Tarun Katial, CEO, ZEE5 India confirms, “We’ve seen a spike across key metros, as audiences continue to consume a wide variety of content. Interestingly, we’ve seen a significant jump in the consumption on connected devices, too, and this could be because many people are working from home.”
Neeraj Roy, Founder & CEO, Hungama Digital Media, shares that since the beginning of March, there has been an increase of over 20% in viewership on Hungama Play. While this trend started in Mumbai, Delhi and Bengaluru, they’re also beginning to notice this spike in other cities. “Further, being at home 24/7 has had a visible impact on consumption hours as well. Instead of peaking between 8-10 in the morning, consumption now remains high till 11.30 am. Likewise, consumption goes up during lunch hours. At night, instead of the usual 8 pm to midnight, consumption now starts peaking at 6 pm,” he informs.Ali Hussein, CEO, Eros Now, on the increase in platform’s engagement during the current lockdown situation, says, “In the era of social distancing, consumers are turning to digital entertainment. We’ve seen an increase of 200% in paid subscribers on a daily basis and App Annie shows a 78% increase in daily traffic.”
ON TREND
With so much ‘spare’ time in hand, OTT content on varied themes has found acceptance. Ferzad Palia, Head- Voot Select, Youth, Music & English Entertainment, Viacom18, says their new shows are already trending. “Our growth can’t be attributed to increased consumption alone… new, original content like Asur (right) and Marzi have received phenomenal response,” he says.Interestingly, apart from recent films such as Chhapaak, Tanhaji: The Unsung Warrior (both on Hotstar), and Street Dancer 3D (on Amazon Prime), doomsday films such as Contagion (featured pic; based on a fictional virus pandemic), Zombieland: Double Tap and the documentary Pandemic: How To Prevent An Outbreak (left), now figure among the top watched films on their respective streaming platforms. On Netflix again, films such as Resident Evil: The Final Chapter (left; above), a sci-fi movie in which humanity is wiped out because of a T-Virus outbreak is on top besides filmmaker Imtiaz Ali’s SHE, a web show, which is trending at Number 1.
Director Neeraj Pandey, whose show Special Ops (left) has received rave reviews upon its release on Hotstar, says that it’s all about the content and the timing of the release doesn’t matter. “If the content is good, people will see it whenever they have time. As a story-teller, you’re essentially working for the audience, and want to have a wider base.”
Roy further reveals that videos across various formats are being watched widely. “Recently we launched Damaged 2 and Kashmakash, or even the ones we launched earlier like Bar Code and Damaged, are witnessing a spike in streaming. Short-format videos under categories of humour, entertainment, health etc. are also being consumed,” he says.Mentalhood (right) on ALT Balaji and Zee5 is also trending, and its actor Dino Morea says, “We came at a good time when everyone is binge watching stuff, and ours is a top-rated show. Glad that people are watching it.”
WHAT’S NEXT
- There’s no stopping these OTT platforms as they continue to churn out new content even in these times.
- ALT Balaji has three new offerings — Who’s Your Daddy, Baarish- Season 2 and XXX UNCENSORED S2.
- “The main objective of our community service campaign #StayALT is to encourage everyone to follow the precautionary directives, while keeping them engaged with a variety of content,” shares Divya Dixit, SVP, Marketing, Analytics & Direct Revenue at ALTBalaji.
- Amazon Prime has made a selection of kids and family content available for free, and will also release Four More Shots Please! Season 2 on April 17. Netflix, meanwhile, has one of its most popular shows, Money Heist’s season 4 lined up for an early April release.
OTT platforms asked to lower streaming quality to reduce internet overload
Industry body Cellular Operators Association of India (COAI) has written to the telecom department and OTT companies to lower the streaming resolution to reduce the burden on the networks in the wake of people staying at home due to the coronavirus outbreak. “During this critical time, it’s essential to cooperate with TSPs to manage traffic distribution patterns which are likely to strain network infrastructure at a time when it is needed for various critical requirements,” COAI’s official letter read.
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