When it comes to the potential audience base in India, streaming platforms have just scratched the surface. But with demand uptick, led by live sports and regional content, the future looks promising
Viewers of streaming platforms in India have increased by 20 percent, from 353.2 million in 2021 to 423.8 million this year, as per a recent Ormax OTT audience report. Over-the-top (OTT) platforms have touched a mere 30 percent of the total population—a majority of which comes from metro cities. The next phase of growth is expected to come from smaller towns and rural India.
“We have seen many of the largescale subscription video on demand (SVOD) platforms cutting prices; customers have now become receptive of paying to watch video content. We believe that SVOD will continue to grow at a slightly higher pace as compared to advertising-based video on demand (AVOD),” says Karan Taurani, SVP, Elara Capital. Currently there are 130.2 million paying SVOD customers, as compared to 110.5 million in 2021.
While the sector continues to grow, the past year has seen a lot happening in the OTT sector, globally as well as in India, and new trends continue to emerge.
to Viacom 18, which offered ₹23,758 crore for 2023-2027.
“We estimate that Disney+ Hotstar is facing the threat of losing between 30 and 40 percent of its subscribers after losing the IPL rights,” says Constantinos Papavassilopoulos, principal analyst at London-based technology consultancy firm Omdia.
While this is a big loss for Disney+ Hotstar, Viacom 18’s OTT platform, Voot, is expected to gain much out of this. Says Taurani, “They [Voot] are not in the sports genre yet, but post IPL, a lot of Disney+ Hotstar’s paying subscribers are likely to move to Voot. But Voot needs to up its game in terms of user experience.”
Also read: If you fail in OTT as an actor, then it's difficult for you to survive: R Madhavan
Manish Kalra, chief business officer, ZEE5 India, explains: “The prominence of regional content, the possibilities to explore new genres, plots and narratives have expanded the scope of content creation. Prominent stars and talent across languages have partnered for big ticket projects on OTT platforms. We introduced exclusive slates, including originals in Tamil, Telugu, Bangla, Marathi, and Punjabi alongside Hindi.”
Watch here: Rewind 2022: Year in Review All Major Events That Happened This Year
(This story appears in the 30 December, 2022 issue of Forbes India. To visit our Archives, click here.)