THE
NEXT FIVE YEARS FOR BUSINESS
(10) TV
Goodbye, Cheap TV
Broadcasters will move to a subscription-revenue model and consumers will have to pay much more for their services
Trying to provide a five day weather
forecast these days is a tricky exercise despite the heaps of technology that
is available to the Met[eorological] department, so trying to put in writing a
five year prediction for TV channels, well… allow me the liberty to share my
thoughts on what I believe will happen with the TV business, but do take it
with a pinch of salt.
January 2018 isn't that far away and TV businesses in India will have their five year plans in place already, so none of this will be any surprise to them, but for those not in the business this may be insightful. First and foremost, broadcasters with networks of channels will have evolved into multi-service providers. In addition to programme production and delivery, they will also provide internet, mobile and landline utility. Those that don't will remain insignificant and do so at their peril. There will be no room for single, stand-alone channels to operate as they do today.
Regulation will have changed to accommodate this change and the bulk of revenues for a broadcaster will be subscription driven. Advertising will have slipped to single digit percentages of the total revenue base and the rest will be a combination of specific, subscription paid for services, chosen by the consumer. Consumers will be expected to pay upwards of Rs 1000 per month for their TV channels, plus the charge for internet services and their telephony. A total of approximately Rs.2000 per month! That's the price of living in a digitised world. Most neighborhood cable operators will have moved out of the business as they will have sold out to a handful of large multi-system operators which will compete with the few remaining DTH platform operators (as against the dozen or so that exist today). Regional language channels across the country will be the channels with the most viewership and will compete head-on with the current crop of Hindi channels.
The ministry of I&B as we know it will become 'ministry of communication services' or even perhaps 'ministry of technological advancement' and be required to develop and supervise policy on each of the service ingredients - content, internet, mobile and delivery platforms. Overall the quality of service will be better but more expensive. Profitability will have improved and lots of M&A's will take place; both domestic and international. It would not be surprising if a large company like Reliance Entertainment steps overseas and acquires a major global media brand (CBS, anyone?) thus bringing Indian media into the forefront of global media activity and enable Indian media executives to make their mark overseas. However big a pinch of salt you took, I can say with certainty that there will be immense excitement in the broadcast environment.
By PETER MUKERJEA, CEO of Star TV, a pioneer in satellite television in India CDET130104
January 2018 isn't that far away and TV businesses in India will have their five year plans in place already, so none of this will be any surprise to them, but for those not in the business this may be insightful. First and foremost, broadcasters with networks of channels will have evolved into multi-service providers. In addition to programme production and delivery, they will also provide internet, mobile and landline utility. Those that don't will remain insignificant and do so at their peril. There will be no room for single, stand-alone channels to operate as they do today.
Regulation will have changed to accommodate this change and the bulk of revenues for a broadcaster will be subscription driven. Advertising will have slipped to single digit percentages of the total revenue base and the rest will be a combination of specific, subscription paid for services, chosen by the consumer. Consumers will be expected to pay upwards of Rs 1000 per month for their TV channels, plus the charge for internet services and their telephony. A total of approximately Rs.2000 per month! That's the price of living in a digitised world. Most neighborhood cable operators will have moved out of the business as they will have sold out to a handful of large multi-system operators which will compete with the few remaining DTH platform operators (as against the dozen or so that exist today). Regional language channels across the country will be the channels with the most viewership and will compete head-on with the current crop of Hindi channels.
The ministry of I&B as we know it will become 'ministry of communication services' or even perhaps 'ministry of technological advancement' and be required to develop and supervise policy on each of the service ingredients - content, internet, mobile and delivery platforms. Overall the quality of service will be better but more expensive. Profitability will have improved and lots of M&A's will take place; both domestic and international. It would not be surprising if a large company like Reliance Entertainment steps overseas and acquires a major global media brand (CBS, anyone?) thus bringing Indian media into the forefront of global media activity and enable Indian media executives to make their mark overseas. However big a pinch of salt you took, I can say with certainty that there will be immense excitement in the broadcast environment.
By PETER MUKERJEA, CEO of Star TV, a pioneer in satellite television in India CDET130104
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