India

A market to get the highest advertising exploitation

A demographic map of 1,117,734,000 people and a huge youth population turn India into an attractive market.

Big shows like Indian Idol, Deal, Fear Factor, Big Brother India, and also comedies, talk shows, movies, series and telenovelas attract 40 million households, which represents approximately 200 million people. "We are the perfect entertainment choice," states Kaushal Modi, Head of Licensing & Telephony for SONY Entertainment Television.

Not only the North American giants but also the European and Latin American producers are after the development of multiple platforms which are on the increase in that country. The North American channel has been producing reality shows, series and even telenovelas for more than a decade. “We are the perfect entertainment choice,” maintains Kaushal Modi, Head Licensing & Telephony for SONY Entertainment Television, as he opens the dialogue. Because they take the lead in a market with 100 million TV households, the powerful Sony Pictures Television International settled there with four channels and multiple broadcasters, becoming an important operator of mobile platforms as well. The Indian production of hit formats such as Indian Idol, Deal, Fear Factor and Big Brother India, together with the adaptation of the Colombian telenovela Yo soy Betty, la fea, gave the channel a really great audience.

“We acquired Soap channel a year and a half ago. It was traditionally directed towards comedy series. However, we have now redefined our policy to make it representative of the Indian youth population.” – Kaushal Modi.

Youth channel
For the young people the alternative is Soap, a channel which targets that booming sector of the population. “We acquired it a year and a half ago. It was traditionally directed towards comedy series. However, we have now redefined our policy to make it representative of the Indian youth population, to whom we offer varied programming and entertainment,” Modi affirms. Pix, the last channel they acquired, has been transmitting for only one year and offers the best Hollywood movies and talk shows such as In the Actor’s Studio.

Alliances andnew technologies
In partnership with Discovery, Sony Television offers documentary programming. It also created a company that distributes international channels that are part of the family – X and Animax, for instance – and others like MTV and news and sports channels. Moreover, Sony Television plans to continue expanding and consolidating itself by taking advantage of new technological resources. “As regards licensing and telephony, our type of digital licensing business aims at capitalizing on the new media networks and media venues present in the market. Basically, we look at any real possibility beyond traditional sources of revenue and business,” he explains. “Our channels have the best content and a huge 10 year old archive, which makes them surpass competitors in the number of programming hours. Since last year, we have been creating content for mobile platform and Internet platform, and we are now exporting our content across these platforms.” In India the mobile business is huge, with over 200 million mobile connections and over 100 million television households. “We have 25 states, which is similar to having 27 countries in one big country. That is how it is,” he concludes.