Pickle April 2016 -- 100th Issue

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POWER LIST: MOST INFLUENTIAL IN INDIAN MEDIA & SHOWBIZ

APRIL 2016

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100th Issue

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International Animation Film Festival and Market

JUNE2016

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We are thankful to all our well-wishers and supporters who have joined hands in our journey. This is our 100th issue, and

hence, a special moment to acknowledge our gratitude to our market partners -- Toronto

International Film Festival/Market, FICCI FRAMES - Mumbai, CII Big Picture Summit

- New Delhi, MIPCOM, MIPTV, American Film Market, ATF Singapore, European Film

Market and Berlinale NAB SHOW, Cannes Film Festival and Market and Annecy -- who

made us what we are today -- to note this THANK YOU

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INDIAN ENTERTAINMENT BUSINESS GUIDE

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MAKE YOURSELF VISIBLE INPICKLE-MAY 2016 CANNES FILM MARKET ISSUE

INDIA AND BEYOND

Pickle reaches out to audio visual companies in over 50 countries; Targets global buyers and distributors; Film Festivals and markets; Animation production companies; Global companies looking at offshoring from India; Co-production seekers and location service providers. Pickle business guide tracks the entertainment business in India.

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We are delighted to present the 100th issue of Pickle on the special occasion of MIPTV at

Cannes. We are thankful to all well-wishers and supporters who have joined hands in our journey. It is a great joy for us. A special thanks to MIPTV and MIPCOM (organised by REED Midem) -- We brought out two dedicated India focused issues every year to these markets since 2007. Cannes is very special and dear to Pickle as we launched the fi rst issue of Pickle during May 2007 when India celebrated 60 years of Independence and that year also marked 60th Cannes Film Festival.Undoubtedly, MIPTV and MIPCOM are the fi nest in the global media markets that empower delegates to network with the best business minds, capture emerging trends, listen to masterminds, create business for product and services and think innovation. It is a must attend for decision makers to grasp the new ecosystems in the media business. Our congratulations to Punit Goenka, Managing Director and CEO, ZEE Group, and his brother, Amit Goenka, CEO – International Broadcast Business, for being honoured by MIPTV Médailles d’Honneur, at a ceremony at Cannes in France on April 6. We also extend

our wishes to other distinguished TV industry leaders who will receive the award at Cannes. They are Rola Bauer, Managing Director, Studiocanal TV GmbH, Germany, Ben Pyne, President, Global Distribution – Disney Media Networks, USA and Marcel Vinay, President, Comarex, Mexico.It is the season of infl uential lists everywhere and we have brought out a comprehensive list of Indian power players who are the most infl uential in driving the media and showbiz. We have segmented it for easy classifi cation and reference. We have devoted less than 60 words for power players, though their infl uence and contribution cannot be measured in these sentences. In a country of 1.2 billion, a list of 100 odd people is meaningless. But it is these names that come to our radar when we think about their contributions. We have added another set of emerging players to the power list as they are the most promising people to occupy the hot seat in the coming years.India is the happening place now. Make in India and Show the World. It is time for some serious business. Please do get in touch with us if you have queries on engaging with Indian M&E business.

n vidyasagarpickle [email protected], www.picklemag.com

Pickle Volume IX 6th edition

Published by Pickle Media Private LimitedEmail: [email protected]

Mumbai ChennaiNo.2, Habib Complex Dr Durgabhai Deshmukh RoadRA Puram CHENNAI 600 028

Printed by Bon GraphicsNew #7, Arumugam Nagar, Dayalan Garden, Chinna Porur,Chennai – 600 116Mobile: +91 9884816263Email: [email protected]

Editorial Coordinators :

M SaiEmail: [email protected]

For advertising: [email protected]

Pickle Business Guide 2016 Copyright 2016 byPickle Media Pvt Ltd. All Rights Reserved.Pickle is an ad supported business guide tracking the fi lmed entertainment business in India.

Layout Design: M Agnes JulieC

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MIPFormats Presentation: For the fi rst time this year, The Wit will be giving MIPFormats participants an exclusive insight into the latest trends in the marketplace, presented by CEO Virginia Mouseler. Two Fresh TV sessions will look at what’s hot in entertainment and game show pilots, and the newest in factual entertain-ment and reality shows. The presentations will also explore the main trends shaping the formats market in 2016.Focus Germany: German companies have the fourth biggest presence at MIPTV and MIPCOM, and this country focus serves to underline the international reach of the German TV industry. In terms of revenue, Germany is the world’s sec-ond biggest television market, with more than 40 million TV households. The market is showing growth across all sectors, in particular pay-TV and VOD, which grew by 7% in 2015 to reach some 2.6 billion. Coproduction partnerships involving

German producers and broadcasters are increas-ing, as international demand grows for scripted and drama formats.MIPDigital Fronts: It will showcase features new online productions, followed by on-stage in-terviews with the creative executives and online talent behind the content. These showcases are designed to foster partnerships within the enter-tainment industry with operators who are aim-ing to assimilate the new codes of content cre-ation that appeal to youth.4K Screening: Also part of the programme is MIPTV’s 4K World Premiere Screening of NHK’s new Asian Fantasy series, ‘Moribito: Guardian of the Spirit.’ Delegates will have the opportuni-ty to watch the fi rst episode of the series on Mon-day, 4 April during the MIPTV Opening Party.

MIPTVHIGHLIGHTS

Around 11,000 delegates, 1,600 exhibitors,

participants from 100 countries and 4,000

buyers are here at MIPTV

The MIPTV conference theme, “The Power of Fans”, refl ects the growing role that audiences, especially fans, are playing within the entertainment ecosystem

Laurine GaraudeDirector of the television division, Reed MIDEM

BESTSELLING AUTHOR HARLAN COBEN; DOMINIQUE DELPORT, PRESIDENT, VIVENDI CONTENT &

GLOBAL MANAGING DIRECTOR, HAVAS MEDIA GROUP; RICHARD DICKSON, PRESIDENT, MATTEL -

TO EXPLORE “THE POWER OF FANS” AT MIPTV

GUILLAUME DE POSCHCo-Chief Executive Offi cer,

RTL Group

BEST MINDS AT MIPTV

RONALDO NAZARIOFootball World Champion

Ronaldo Nazario, Football World Champion and Brazil’s Globo Sports

Commentator, will take to the stage at MIPTV to keynote a spotlight

showcase on Globo’s extensive sports broadcasting capabilities in lead

up to world coverage of the Rio 2016 Olympic and Paralympic Games

in Brazil.

Presented in partnership with Globo, Ronaldo, aka “the Phenomenon,”

will address MIPTV on Tuesday 5 April from 9.30 to 10.00 in the

Esterel conference room of the Palais des Festivals

The MIPTV Focus on Germany will provide TV professionals from

around the world with a unique opportunity to discover new Ger-

man programming, meet top-level executives from the German

TV industry, and forge new partnerships with German producers.

Lead partners, Red Arrow International and ZDF Enterprises, will

host special conference sessions on international production and

co-production of scripted and non-scripted TV programmes. Other

German media companies confi rmed as partners with the Focus on

Germany programme include Deutsche Welle, Global Screen and

WDR mediagroup. In addition, Beta Film will host an international

screening on Monday 4 April. An enlarged German Pavilion will be

back on the MIPTV exhibition fl oor with AG Dok, ARRI Media, Ger-

man Films, SOLA Media, Spiegel TV, and Your Family Entertainment

already confi rmed as exhibitors.

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MIPTV 2016 MÉDAILLES D’HONNEUR: FROM LEFT TO RIGHT: ROLA BAUER (TANDEM PRODUCTIONS/STUDIOCANAL), AMIT

GOENKA AND PUNIT GOENKA (ZEEL- ZEE ENTERTAINMENT ENTERPRISES LIMITED), BEN PYNE (DISNEY MEDIA NETWORKS)

AND MARCEL VINAY (COMARE)

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Setting Eyes on New Frontiers

The geographical spread of Zee En-tertainment is an amazing story. Now that you have set your foot to lead the international portfolio at ZEE, where do you see this going ahead?With our Vision 2020 goal of becoming one of the top global media companies in fi ve years, we have a very strong ex-pansion focus in the international mar-ket. We want to go beyond the South Asian diaspora in other countries and reach out to the local audiences glob-ally. While we have been mainly re-pur-posing our existing content — dubbing or sub-titling it in the local languages — we have also started with select local productions in international territories such as the Middle East, Russia and cer-tain countries in Asia. Going ahead, we are focusing on Germany, Africa, Latin America, APAC and the Middle East as the key markets for expansion.

Expanding Indian content to new ter-ritories is pushing the soft power of India? Please share your comments.There is a large reservoir of values in India that the world can benefi t from. We take it as our responsibility to share this around the globe in an entertaining way.

Do you see visible changes happen-ing around the media business to-day? The tide is towards digital...The world is going digital in a very big way today. With consumers preferring devices with larger screens along with the availability of cheaper, faster band-width, we are seeing a lot of video con-sumption happening on second-screen devices such as mobile phones and tab-lets. Consumers, especially the youth, are displaying a preference for shorter, bite-sized video content which can be viewed and shared conveniently. With consumers wanting to consume content anytime, anywhere on their smart de-vices, all the big players in the Indian media industry are now massively ex-panding to digital.

The business models are changing rapidly in the global media space. Many markets are giving way to SVOD and OTT. Where do you see ZEE grow global in this space both in content and platform?Digital is a major focus area for us. Inter-nationally, our Zeefamily.tv Application is already available in the US as well as in select Asia Pacifi c countries, where it has received wonderful traction since its launch. The Catch-up feature and the

As the Zee Group gears up to expand its global reach, Amit Goenka, CEO, International Broadcast Business, talks about the goals and strategies that would drive the group’s international ambitions in the next few years and what kind of challenges he expects to face while entering new territories

Amit GoenkaCEO, International Broadcast Business, ZEEL

NEW LEADER AT ZEEL


VOD option have found strong prefer-ence with our viewers. Our goal was to make ZEE’s extensive library of content available to our viewers wherever and whenever they want to watch TV. In In-dia, we have recently launched OZEE, a user-friendly AVOD platform which will deliver the best of entertainment con-tent from ZEE within minutes of its tele-vision telecast. Our other subscription-led OTT platform, dittoTV, which was India’s fi rst OTT platform, has received wide acceptance and has already started producing original content.

The global footprint of ZEE and its content distribution is spread across continents? Do you see growth focus in any particular region?Our international growth and expansion is not limited to any particular region. While our Germany launch is next on the cards, we are also looking at Latin America, parts of APAC and Africa.

India is one of the most liberal media markets in the world. Is there a level playing fi eld for an Indian company like ZEE when going to new markets? What are the challenges? There are many challenges and differ in accordance with each market. Some mar-kets are over congested, while some are saturated in penetration. With a move towards digital, this is changing. We also believe as a sincere and dedicated media enterprise, there is always place

amongst the audience markets for us.

The Indian M&E industry has set an ambitious target to reach $100 bil-lion from current $20 billion levels over the next fi ve to seven years. How much of this can come from interna-tional markets? Do you see this hap-pening?This will depend on the regulatory framework being conducive for India in the foreign markets. The fi lm, television and digital industry from India will cer-tainly lead the foray in the international markets.

What are the challenges of achieving this?Local competition, established players, uncertainty of distribution platforms, volatile economic and socio-political scenarios as well as the audience shift to new devices and mediums are some of the main challenges.

Investment (primarily infrastruc-ture), skill sets and innovation are critical elements in M&E growth go-ing forward. All these three are in-suffi cient/scarce in the Indian media space. How do we scale new heights?Infrastructure is defi nitely the area where support is required from our own establishments. Skill sets and innova-tion are scalable and India is amongst the world’s best talent pools. Faster inno-vation is the key to reach new heights.

Skill sets and innovation are scalable and India is amongst the world’s best talent pools. Faster innovation is the key to reach new heights

To prevent this argument from going soft it’s perhaps best to start with a story, even if it’s an anecdote about an anecdote. Despite hav-

ing never met the man in question, an acquaintance of mine from Mumbai once recalled how Amitabh Bachchan may have saved his life in the dusty valleys of Afghanistan. The storyteller, an Indian diplomat, who shall we say functions as part of the spear tip of Indian statecraft, was in the Central Asian nation soon after the Taliban’s ouster in 2002 and looking to make contact with a few leaders of the putative Northern Alliance. Suddenly besieged and presented to a different set of warlords he found himself un-able to break the ice with them, and was soon gravely informed that they suspected him of being a Paki-

stani spook, the “enemy” they loathed. That is until he spied a tattered poster of Bachchan’s 1992 hit Khuda Gawah (‘God is the Witness’, a fi lm shot exten-sively in Afghanistan) in the next room and decided to talk Bollywood -- to im-mediate excitement among the Afghan warriors. Unable to recall any song from that fi lm, however, he found him-self back in the doghouse, until he start-ed belting out ‘Mehbooba, Mehbooba’ from Sholay, the 1975 blockbuster that launched Bachchan to superstardom, and is perhaps the most famous Hindi fi lm west of Amritsar. An agreement was soon concluded and the diplomat found himself warmly escorted back to his base with much fi erce debate about the new “Khan ishtars” in Mumbai. The tale might have perhaps grown lon-ger in the telling but there’s no disput-ing how popular Indian fi lms now are in many parts of the world. Clearly, go-ing soft need not be inopportune. For

Understanding Indian cinema’s global appeal and ‘soft power’

MAKING A SONGAND DANCE OF IT


India, with its old civilisation and spiritual customs based on universalist traditions, has always had several cards to play in this game. Indian commercial cinema, with its distinct rhythms, is the latest addition to the pack

Praveen Dass is an independent fi lmmaker and fi ne art photographer currently based in [email protected]

by Praveen Dass

well over two decades now foreign poli-cy wonks have waxed eloquent about the merits of ‘soft power’ for nations look-ing to fi nd their places at the global high table. India, with its old civilisation and spiritual customs based on universalist traditions, has always had several cards to play in this game. Indian commercial cinema, with its distinct rhythms, is the latest addition to the pack. As a noted strategic affairs guru puts it: “Bolly-wood has done more for Indian infl u-ence abroad than all the bureaucratic efforts of the government”. But there’s still some way to go, for both industry and creative artists cynically churning out assembly-line movies in the country, and for the state making more concerted efforts to better push what is arguably India’s most exciting export goodie.

Masala Stardust

Much water has fl own down the Gan-ges since earlier generations of Indians were often told of how much Russians loved Raj Kapoor’s cloyingly Chap-linesque tramp from Awara, or of how

Dilip Kumar was as much a heartthrob in Lahore and Dhaka as he was in Mum-bai. Beyond old ties of cultural kin-ship in the subcontinent and bilateral arrangements between governments (which saw a handful of Indian fi lms being regularly exported to ‘friendly’ countries like the Soviet Union or Mon-golia), Indian cinema has struck out and conquered bold newer frontiers now. Indian superstars like Aishwarya Rai and Aamir Khan regularly walk the red carpet at big fi lm festivals like Cannes, Toronto and Venice and are recognised globally. Southern superstar Rajini-kanth was a cultural phenomenon in Ja-pan for a while, where local fans dubbed him ‘Dancing Maharajah” and landed up in exotic Indian costumes for his movie premieres. Bolly superstar Shah Rukh Khan was conferred a high Ma-laysian state honour which even stirred controversy there with many protesting that local actors were ignored. Several actors also increasingly pop up in the tabloid press when holidaying abroad in the West -- a surer sign of cross-cultural traction than any box-offi ce grosses -- and are now slowly experimenting with


Rajinikanth fans in Japan

Fans cheering up Shah Rukh Khan A poster of Sholay

taking up meaty roles in fi lms in a more globalised Hollywood. There’s no denying Indian movie stars’ graphs have seen increasingly steep rises from the last decade into this one. If pirated videotapes in the 1980s kick-started the revolution, the internet – and its endlessly cyclical streams of video content -- appears to have solidifi ed this reach, taking Indian fi lm to places as far afi eld as North Africa, Western Europe, Japan and South Korea. In fact there’s a reason Indian fi lm distributors now delay releasing Hindi or Tamil fi lms in many foreign markets, despite the lucra-tive business many fi lms do there. Most pirated DVDs that land up almost imme-diately after fi lm premieres on Indian shores come from these places.

Home is where the heart is

In briefl y analysing this trans-cultural appeal of Indian cinema two major fac-tors must be noted. One, the size, breadth and rising cultural assertiveness of the Indian diaspora across the world has been a factor so huge it’s changed Bol-lywood in several noteworthy ways. The expatriate Indian’s outsize longing for identity and roots has helped reshape the country’s fi lm trade. The foreign box offi ce (BO) contributes so signifi -cantly to big movies in Hindi, Tamil and Telugu that several duds at the local BO actually go on to make profi ts from the diaspora dollar. Many fi lms now have exclusive premieres in London and New York, unthinkable even a decade and a half ago. Pioneered by fi lmmakers like

Subash Ghai -- who was actually lam-pooned in the mid 1990s for ‘pandering’ to Non Resident Indian (NRI) audiences -- the size of this market has even led to the content changing in Bollywood. Indi-an fi lms have got slicker, costlier and are now set in locales across the globe with many actors often playing NRI charac-ters, echoing vaguely NRI concerns. Film markets at festivals worldwide now see sizeable Indian delegations hawking new productions for distributors to pick up or producers to take up. Outside of Bollywood, Tamil fi lm producers now tie-up ‘FMS’ (Foreign, Malaysia, Sin-gapore) rights before they get down to haggling with local distributors about territories and sales, while Telugu pro-ducers line up small European and size-able North American releases for their new fi lms.NRIs, it seems, just can’t get enough of the fi lmy glamour from their old coun-try in any way possible. Many fi lm stars now earn big bucks from performing at ‘Bollywood Nights’ abroad. These are-na shows, staged almost exclusively in countries with large NRI populations, have also proven so lucrative that sev-eral stars either long in the tooth back home or relegated to the background now make their money purely from ‘touring’.

The spectacular results are there for the world to see. Indeed, whatever your cinematic inclinations you would have to admit, where would Indian cinema be without all that song and dance? The world agrees


A poster of Sivaji

Business is booming overseas, yet as any big producer, distributor or cultural com-mentator will tell you, much remains to be done to increase penetration beyond the diaspora. The odd viral video of Eu-ropeans doing ‘Bollywood dancing’ for small audiences or weddings with a Bol-lywood theme are still too few and far be-tween for Indian cinema to be labelled a widespread crossover phenomenon. Un-like, say, with the martial arts fi lms that crossed over from Hong Kong and China to the West over three decades ago; or Japanese creature features, manga or ‘J-Horror’ genres. They infl uence Hol-lywood, still the gold standard for big feature fi lm production. To change that requires tinkering with the old formula for Indian cinema. It would mean going more ‘arty’ (a despised phrase in Indian fi lm production circles) and looking to imbibe and reconstruct in singular fash-ion genres, themes and narrative experi-ments from elsewhere. And not just in form. Which is, of course, easier said than done. A strong recidivist streak resides deep inside Indian fi lmdom. The formula may not be periodically dumped or retired for a new genre to rise to the top of the heap à la Hollywood. This in turn has a lot to do with why the formula is the way it is. Why fi x what ain’t broke? And besides, this formula is the second reason Indian fi lms have such a large global reach. It’s why they speak in unmatched dulcet tones to several other developing societ-ies that have much more in common with Indian audiences than they suspect.

Think Local, Act Global

There’s a reason India is referred to as a subcontinent. The sum of its many ethnic, cultural and linguistic parts is perhaps greater than the whole. With over 25 major languages spoken and over 700 hundred dialects, not to men-tion large ethnic, cultural and religious divisions, nation building and unity was a challenge the founders and early build-ers of modern India took very seriously indeed. Cinema was soon harnessed to the task in the 1950s. Filmmakers and writers took on matters of great na-tional and social import and until the mid 1960s (when romances got mushier and a new generation of glamorous lov-ers and sex symbols appeared onscreen) and early 70s (when public anger against a dysfunctional state and crony capital-ism exploded on screens across India) sought to craft a cohesive cinema that provided ‘wholesome’ family entertain-ment while dwelling on traditional Indi-an values and customs. These fi lms had to crossover from one region of India to another that had about as much in com-mon with each other as two European countries do. They had to transcend bar-riers of language, class, creed and eth-nicity. They began doing that for almost every big Bollywood release in roughly the late 60s to early 70s. The seeds of a global formula were sown right there. In fact, in addition to India’s remarkable


Aishwarya Rai at Cannes Film Festival

(even if slightly fl awed) tryst with liber-al democracy, several theorists and his-torians have championed Bollywood in particular as a great force for national integration in what ought to have been a rather fractious country of infi nite di-versity. To put it a little simplistically, a template was slowly evolved and contin-ues to form the basis of cinema to this day with very little variations on the theme, even if the forms have changed over time. Also powered by audiences changing with a new liberalising India, new fi lms from the mid 1990s began to be increas-ingly located abroad (and not just for the songs) while the melodrama remained fi rmly rooted in varying interpretations of ‘Indianness’. Over the year the char-acters got glitzier, the stars got shinier, the songs got dreamier, the love stories got mushier, the gangsters and vigilan-tes got nastier and the Hollywood-in-spired action sequences got edgier, but the melodramatic tensions remained pretty much the same. It made -- and still makes -- for a heady mix. Yet at its core Indian cinema is still mostly all about family, culture, traditions and, of course, romance. And the increasing de-mands that modernity makes on each of those. This is largely what appeals to audi-ences in countries that are grappling with the rapid changes wrought by the modern world and increasingly break-

neck Westernization of societies. So from much of the Arab world to Cen-tral Asia and parts of South East Asia, from Africa and to many parts of Latin America, Indian fi lms deal with societal tensions that people deal with on a daily basis. Despite the candyfl oss glamour on top, which merely provides for the perfect escapism for such audiences. And an alternate ‘warm’ escapism, one that comes straight from the heart; as opposed to what Hollywood provides, which for these audiences tends to be ei-ther too cerebral, too Western or merely a visceral rush. The neo-Shakespearean tragicomic genre that Bollywood has made its own is a different fl avour to be savoured with everyone. No wonder it’s a hit. Besides, there’s also one special secret sauce added into the mix. The one genre that India perhaps took and refashioned in singular fashion more than any other to make it its own more than any oth-er: the old Hollywood musical format. Which was quickly fused with classical Indian traditions of devotional and the-atrical musical performance. The spec-tacular results are there for the world to see. Indeed, whatever your cinematic inclinations you would have to admit, where would Indian cinema be with-out all that song and dance? The world agrees. Come, sing along. Or better yet, dance.


Songs and dance are essence of Indian cinema

• Push notifi cation is growing: People are no longer reading anything longer than a push no-tifi cation on their mobile. Due to this trend of glanceable content , companies like Huffi ngton Post have journalists who are just writing noti-fi cations. The headline writers are the next gen-eration of the successful news creator. Even pub-lishers like NY times have realized this trend and have set up a dedicated team to exclusively focus on creation and scheduling of notifi cations and push alerts without overly annoying and inter-rupting users. Research clearly shows increasing number of users will only engage with the pub-lisher when they send a push and they will not read something on their own.

• Ubiquitous smartphones: Smartphones outsell PCs by 5:1 now and in the next few years they will raise to 10:1. Eventually, smartphones will end up becoming smarter and feature rich. TV viewing has dropped by 30% in the last 4 years for the 18-24 segment - the most prized segment for adver-tisers. The millenials check their mobile phone every 10 minutes and 80% of their time mobile is always by their side and 80% of them check their mobile phone as their fi rst activity in the morn-ing.

• Vertical video formats: Vertical video formats are growing faster as they have better user expe-rience. According to snapchat which is serving billions of vertical videos in a day, vertical vid-eos outperform horizontal video upto 9 times. We see in the near future, all breaking news events will be covered with Live Video in HD on mobile with multiple angle views.

• Robo journalism: With technologies in areas like Natual language processing and pattern rec-ognition from companies like Automated Insights and Narrative Science, are being used to creat au-tomated earnings report for the Associated Press

Things are changing fast. Consumption of infotain-ment is no more the same. So, how to cater to the millenials

Srini Vasan is President & CEO of Quantum Ven-tura Inc, a social media analytics and twitter realtime analytics product company based in Los Angeles and Silicon Valley

by Srini Vasan


EMERGING TRENDS IN DIGITAL MEDIA

LANDSCAPE


and sports reports for Yahoo. Readers couldnt tell the difference between reports generated by algorithms and journalists. Twitter bots are already generating thousands of bot updates everyday with Japan leading the way.

• Next generation drones: Next gen-eration drones will redefi ne breaking news production and will severely dis-rupt the traditional news gathering infrastructure. Washington Post and CNN are working on an experimen-tal drone production system. Amazon Prime Air is yet another example of ecommerce and drone technology are married.

• Virtual reality and augmented re-ality: will explode further and these will redefi ne the content production itself. Applications like breaking news, adventure, shopping, sports and entertainment segments will be the initial segments where VR will be deployed.

• Shifting beyond clicks and views: Companies are shifting beyond from clicks and views to increasing levels of engagement as their top priority while balancing the need to driver greater reach. Today, consumers seek whatever they want, be it products, content or experiences, when they want it through the best means that is available to them at that present moment and circumstances. In this consumer journey, consumers are the king. Only those brands which recog-nize this gospel truth, can succeed in engaging the consumers long term.

• Ad-fraud on the rise: With the ex-plosion of digital advertising, the gr-woth of ad fraud is also increasing at a staggering rate. In the US alone, the ad fraud amounted to US$6.3 billion ie 20% of total advertising in the US). Research showed that software bots viewed 11% of display ads and 25% of video ads. This will be a serious chal-lenge in the years to come.

• Growth of social ecommerce: We will see more and more ecommerce applications be embedded into the so-cial media pages. For example, Pinter-est allows users to buy items that are shown on the page directly.

• Television will see pain in the com-ing decade: In the coming decade, television will start seeing the pain that newspapers felt a few years due to loss of advertising revenue to digital. Younger generation is increasingly starting to embrace “cord-cutting” , canceling their cable TV service or getting rid of channels they are not interested in. 50 million households in the US now subscribe to OTT like netf-lix. Such disruptions have forced com-

panies like ESPN to lay off jobs in the wake of falling cable revenues and loss of advertising to digital. PayTV house-holds is steady at 97 million whereas OTT is climbing up from 23 million in 2010 to 50 million in 2015.

In a startling statistics, median viewer age is 60 for MSNBC and CNN. Broad-cast networks 62-64 and Fox News 68 and these networks have lost signifi -cant amount of ad dollars due to mil-lenials deserting from TV to digital medium.

Old media will not die. Instead , old media will shrink further and become a niche player similar to print.

• Explosive growth of OTT players: Due to explosive growth of OTT play-ers, we will see companies like Netfl ix will start mimicking traditional con-tent producers instead of just depend-ing on others content. Netfl ix is plan-ning to invest $6b in original content which is more than the entire budget of BBC and their revenue is expected to be $12.2 billion by 2020. Netfl ix is watched more hours per month than almost every other network in the US.

• Ad-blocking tech vs digital adver-tising: 198 million users have used some form of ad blocking technology which is threatening the digital adver-tising in a big way. If ads are blocked, free content will disappear as it will be economically not viable. This may lead to a compromise where users will choose which ads they would like to watch which in turn will force adver-tisers to produce better content and user experience for their audience.

• Messaging apps beat social me-dia apps: Top 4 messaging apps , whatsapp, FB messenger, Wechat and Viber have overtaken top 4 social me-dia apps with 3 billion monthly active users compared to 2.5 billion users for social media apps. We will see messag-ing apps will grow further. Interest-ingly, facebook owns two top messag-ing apps and 2 top social media apps.

• Brands cannot repurpose TV ads: Brands will have to recognize that re-purposing TV ads for digital medium will not work and brands have to think ads specifi cally catering to each me-dium. What appears great in a TV ad will not look good in a vertical ad in samsung mobile. Brands will have to become technologically aware of the context and device of the consumer and shift to context based marketing from a traditional general purpose online and mobile digital marketing. Smart marketeers will study the me-dia mix of their audience and serve advertising accordingly.


Cashing in on Digital Opportunities

Can you give a perspective of where is action at this point of time in the industry? And, where is Shemaroo heading?Shemaroo is a content owner aggregator and distributor. We are an agnostic con-tent aggregator not linked to technology or a platform. Our target is to go where the consumers are. In fi lms, our current focus is on re-issue of fi lms. The second area of focus is television. We syndicate content to channels across categories, genres and platforms. The third place where consumer is headed and which is at a nascent stage is the digital media (Internet or mobile based digitally deliv-ered content). We have created a space for ourselves in this medium. TV and new media are focus for us where the consumer is headed.

How does Shemaroo Entertainment see it ride on the digital now world?We have been monetizing our content on many digital platforms. Anyone who wants to run a Bollywood service has to work at some level with Shemaroo. We are not exclusively aligned to any one platform. Our business model is to dis-tribute content in as many platforms. It is something similar to home video days -- where we used to give DVDs to as many

stores who would want to keep our DVD or content. Every new platform that comes in the market is a new shop front. It is something similar to the product available in all e-commerce platforms. At this point of time we do not know where the consumers will go. Working with various platforms will be the way we will look at it.

Tell us about your Miniplex product being offered by Tata Sky and Airtel to DTH subscribers. Traditionally, after the theatrical win-dow we had the home video window and television window. Now home video has shrunk and it is in the process of mi-grating to the digital store. But digital has not fully arrived. With Miniplex, we wanted to create a premium window to replace the home video window.We offer one premiere every week. The consumer has the opportunity to watch four premieres in a month. Every Friday, we have eight shows. In a week we have 14 shows. The monthly subscription is Rs 60 and annual Rs 720. It is ad-free.We will be adding more platforms. In a way, we are looking at movies which have lost out after the theatrical release and did not get the post theatrical mar-ket. It is a win-win for everyone. Film

Digitization has opened up new opportunities for content companies. Hiren Gada, Director and CFO, Shemaroo Entertainment, talks about how his company is riding on the digital wave to reach out to its consumers

Hiren GadaCFO, Shemaroo Entertainment

DIGITAL HIGHWAY


producer is happy as he could see some monetization, while platforms are get-ting new fi lms. Consumers who missed those movies in theatre can catch them at home. There is value to everyone in the ecosystem. It is not absurdly priced and we have priced it reasonably.Cable digitization has pushed scale. DTH has created mindset to pay for premium services, the conducive mindset, ecosys-tem and environment to have these ser-vices. We are headed more in that direc-tion.

Will you be looking at reaching Mini-plex in global platforms?At this point of time, it is primarily for India we have started on DTH platforms. We are exploring other international platforms as well.

Is it a conscious decision that you have not started your own platform?At the end of the day we are a content company. We are not a technology com-pany. We decided to leverage existing technology platforms.

Last year, of the 1,200 fi lms only 600 fi lms got released in theatres. Are you looking at releasing some mov-ies directly on these platforms?That is not in our thought process. At this point of time for Miniplex we are looking at fi lms which are theatrically released.

Will you be looking at increasing the number of premier’s in Miniplex?No.

Do you fund fi lms that you release in Miniplex?We don’t look at anything pre-release. The fi lm is evaluated post release. Since the product has stabilised in both the platforms -- Tata Sky and Airtel DTH -- we will be looking at award-winning festival circuit regional movies. We are looking at the opportunity to have these fi lms subtitled. But we have not explored this space.Our immediate focus is to expand the presence of Miniplex and take the ser-vice to certain traction.

Anyone who wants to run a Bollywood

service has to work at some

level with Shemaroo


We understand Indian Consumer Very Well

How is the gaming industry develop-ing in India?There are around 300 gaming developers in India and their number is growing. Many are two or three-member teams. Being a publisher, I think it is in our in-terest to have quality developers in the ecosystem.

Why do you focus only on mobile?That’s the way to go. The hardware is getting cheaper with the time and ph-ablets (5 -7 inches) are gaining popular-ity in India. We are purely focused on mobile gaming content.

What’s working for Nazara? We run a subscription business and we understand the Indian consumer very well. Our consumers are not internet savvy so we have been trying to remove all frictions in gaming. We have created a daily pack (like HLL we have a sachet and a big bucket). The content is ad-free and there are no in-app purchases. You simply pay X amount and play as many games as you want.We are interested in consumers who are playing games for the fi rst time. They want simple games. They are watchful

about spending money on downloading apps. So, we create game for not savvy gamers but casual gamers. That is what is working for us.

Nazara’s licensing deal with Green Gold seems to be a big hit among kids...We have signed a deal with Green Gold for fi ve year licensing of Chhota Bheem. A large number of children see Chota Bheem as a super hero. We have created a game called Chotta Bheem Jungle Run, where kids can make him fl y and bang into things. The casual game has been downloaded more than 10 million times.We have another game based on Virat Kohli. Indian kids love to hit fours and sixes. This game challenges them to hit as many boundaries as possible in a giv-en number of balls.My view is to understand local consum-er and have a strategy of what works for them instead of blindly copying the West.

Is your target age group is 14 years and below?Yes that’s true. We understand that there are two types of gamers in India — kids

The Indian gaming industry is poised for a huge growth given the increasing penetration of mobile technology in the country, says Manish Agarwal, CEO, Nazara Technologies

Manish AgarwalCEO, Nazara Technologies

NAZARA: GAMING VIA MOBILE


under 14 and males in the age-group 18-33. We have partnered with Tinkle games and are going to make games based on Supandi and Shambu Shikari. We have signed up with Hrithik Roshan and will be doing shooting games too.

What are the major challenges in In-dia’s gaming industry today?Not having a good developer ecosystem and access to right developers are ma-jors challenges. Gaming can be so ad-dictive when it involves multi players in real time. But it is yet to happen in India because of the slow Internet speeds. An-other challenge is the lack of payment options. Mobile wallets can be the an-swer to this.

Please share your experience of working with Nazara Technologies after your stint at Reliance GamingAt Reliance, I was focussed on gaming outside of India. I am a fi rm believer in the Indian smartphone market growth and wanted to be in a position to cash in on the new opportunities.In 2006, I was running ecommerce in this country. But today when the ecom-merce is witnessing a boom, I am no one in the ecommerce space. I don’t want the history to repeat itself.Nazara is very focused on India. It has a very large distribution reach which attracted me to not start from scratch and make it succeed in India. The urge to be number one gaming player in India brought me to Nazara.


M


Industry veteran Amit Khanna, in a freewheeling chat with Pickle, says the Indian M&E sector needs

massive investments, innovative thinking and greater emphasis

on skilled manpower to grow its clout in the global market

INDIAN&E SECTOR

The Indian Media and Entertainment industry needs $50 bil-lion worth of investment in the next fi ve years and the me-dia leadership needs a complete mindset change to drive its

growth on global scale, according to Amit Khanna, media veteran and former chairman of Reliance Entertainment. “If you see the total investment in the last 10 years in the entire Indian media and entertainment industry, it would be less than what a Flipkart has invested. The reason why money is not coming in is because of the poor business model. People have been on an expansion mode without adequate planning,” said Khanna in an exclusive interview with Pickle.The media veteran feels that the mindset among the top M&E play-ers needs to change. “The media and entertainment industry is looking at the world with the wrong end of the binocular. Every-thing is far and looks unattainable. What you don’t realise is you need to inverse the binoculars.”In terms of fi gures, only $20 billion is spent on the Indian media and entertainment sector, which is only 1 per cent of the country’s GDP. “Our share of the world market is less than 1 per cent in the $3 trillion global media and entertainment market,” Khanna ex-plained, adding that India’s per capita media spend needs to go up drastically to ensure growth.To increase the market share of India, there is a need of massive investment in trained professionals and innovation, which is not forthcoming.Khanna, who is currently researching for his encyclopaedia on the


history of media and entertainment in India, said that no Indian M&E business in the last 20 years has grown beyond Rs. 10,000 crore. “It is a sad story. It refl ects on the inability of the indus-try to reinvent itself and grow,” he observed.He also feels that the Indian M&E sector is at least 10 years behind the curve in technology.“It requires drastic steps. The government should get out of business and businesses need to get into business.”However, Khanna is optimistic about investment coming from Reliance Jio, Netfl ix, Amazon and many other companies like them. “This is al-ready happening in India. We will see changes happen soon,” he said.Khanna admitted that even Reliance Entertain-ment could not sustain itself. “I was involved with Reliance Entertainment. We invested $1 billion. That was not enough. Then we stopped. We needed investment to become a major player in all media verticals. We needed another $2 to $3 billion which we could not raise or invest. That’s why we failed,” Khanna said.Only Star India and Zee and to some extent, Sony Entertainment Televison, have invested in the M&E business, according to him.“Though Star India and Zee are there, they are not innovating enough. They do one innova-tive show and think they are doing great work. There is virtually zero innovation,” he noted.Khanna maintained that India has not tapped the digital market suffi ciently. “We keep talking about OTT. We should not talk about delivery or access technology. We should talk about what the audience will access in that. It cannot be repur-posed content. Every broadcaster has started a digital platform and they are telecasting the same programme as on TV. The audience who are online are not interested in that content. Dig-ital platform is not for repurposed content. “Interestingly, he predicted that mobile would be-come an access device in future. “Everybody is not going to see movies on the mobile phone. We will use the mobile to download the fi lm or con-nect it to a home TV. Already projectors are get-ting launched which projects a normal image from a mobile phone onto the wall,” he said.The Indian M&E industry should produce less and earn more, according to Khanna. “Last year, out of 1,200 feature fi lms only 600 got released. The number of unreleased fi lms is going to go up with only 300 to 400 fi lms getting released in future. That’s the reality. Similarly, 850 TV chan-nels are not viable,” he said.The government cannot be blamed for every-thing. “The government’s role in this sector should be of benign interference. The govern-ment has no role in the industry except bringing out some broad legislations. The fact is there is lack of investment and trained professionals. In 30 years, we have come from untrained people to semi-trained people. We have plenty of half-skilled people. Fully-skilled people are very few,” the former chairman of Reliance Enter-tainment said.

No Indian M&E business in the last 20 years has grown be-yond Rs. 10,000 crore. It is a sad story. It refl ects on the inability of the industry to rein-vent itself and grow

Amit Khanna

Most Infl uential in Indian Media &

Showbiz

POWER LIST

107

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TITANS

MOST INFLUENTIAL IN INDIAN MEDIA & SHOWBIZ

SUBHASH CHANDRAPromoter & Chairman, Zee GroupThe appetite for taking big risks and for-ward thinking made him launch India’s fi rst satellite TV channel, Zee TV, in 1992. Today, his TV channels, numbering up to 70, reach millions of people. With inter-ests ranging from theme parks, cinema multiplexes and newspaper, recently he announced entry into the international news space with an English TV channel, World is One News.

MUKESH AMBANIChairman, Reliance IndustriesThe richest man in India is known for his astute business acumen. Under his guidance, India’s largest private com-pany Reliance Industries has expanded its infl uence in a wide range of sectors. In the media and entertainment sphere, his out-of-the-box swap strategy with the Network18 has catapulted him in a com-manding position. All is set for Reliance Jio launch.

VINEET JAINMD, Bennett ColemanThinking ahead of times, the Vineet Jain has successfully transformed Bennett, Coleman & Co. Ltd. (BCCL) into India’s largest media conglomerate – setting the agenda for change and rejuvenation of India’s print industry. Despite the group’s relatively small size in the global league, it packs a huge punch and exemplifi es what innovative marketing and branding can achieve.


FACEBOOKMark Zuckerberg, CEOThe social network has completely changed the way we communicate. With its plan to show live sports events like NFL, it may seriously make inroads into traditional TV segment and redefi ne the future of TV. In future, we may expect more and more conventional media companies depending on the social network to distribute their content either by selling the content or li-censing the content to it.

KALANITHI MARANChairman, Sun GroupHe is credited with redefi ning Tamil televi-sion entertainment. Despite the media bar-on’s businesses currently under siege, there is no doubt on his infl uence in the media business. With its TV channels including its fl agship SunTV and cable/DTH business, 48 FM channels across the country, two daily newspapers, fi ve magazines, an IPL fran-chise (Sun Risers Hyderabad), he continues to be a major force to reckon with.

GOOGLESundar Pichai, CEOThe Silicon Valley behemoth is far ahead of its competition when it comes to digi-tal advertising revenue, which is expected to be $44b this year. Its premier property YouTube features some of the biggest stars who are considered more infl uen-tial than Hollywood actors and actresses. Such is the power of Google and its eco-system. For youngsters, the platform has emerged as a lifeline for entertainment.

RUPERT MURDOCHChairman, Twenty-First Century FoxThe media tycoon’s News Corp. is a global powerhouse across the board -- print, tele-vision and fi lm. He has extensive media interests in India, including HarperCol-lins Publishers as well as its 21st Century Fox-owned satellite network, besides the successful STAR TV, which broadcasts 40 entertainment, movie and news channels in seven languages and reaches over 700 million viewers.


AVEEK SARKARProprietor & Chief Editor, ABP GroupThe infl uence of Aveek Sarkar, Kolkata-based media baron and chief editor of the Anandabazar Group of Publications, is not limited to the newspapers, magazines and television channels that he owns. It extends into the cultural sphere. Ananda-bazar Patrika, the group’s fl agship is one of the most widely read dailies in India. It reaches virtually every Bengali-speaking home and sways public choices.

AROON PURIEChairman & Editor-in-Chief, India Today GroupA chartered accountant-turned publisher, who is the editor-in-chief of the Living Me-dia group’s magazines, including the 40-year-old infl uential India Today, has been the guiding force when it comes to editorial focus and revenue generation. Not a single page in his publications ever goes without him having gone over it with a fi ne tooth comb. The buck stops at his table.

DR. PRANNOY ROYExecutive Co-Chairperson, NDTV GroupThe co-founder of NDTV is a well-known journalist and television personality, who is an idol to millions of young Indians aspiring to make it as TV journalists. A trained economist, Roy dabbled in psephol-ogy before hitting the big time in Indian television towards the latter half of the last decade. NDTV today remains one of India’s best news and current affairs outfi t.

SHOBHANA BHARTIAChairperson & Editorial Director, HT MediaThe fi rst woman chief executive of a nation-al newspaper, professionalism and readi-ness to let her team work on their own terms are the two outstanding qualities that let her catapult the fortunes of HT Media’s fl agship publications. She holds the credit of raising Rs 400 crore via public equity launch of the HT Media group in 2005 and played a pivotal role in revamping the image of the Hindu-stan Times into a “bright and young paper”.


S. BALASUBRAMANIAN ADITYANMD, Daily Thanthi GroupThe managing director of Daily Thanthi group, which runs ‘Dina Thanthi’, one of the largest circulated newspapers in India, has learnt the art of management from his father Sivanthi Adityan. Start-ing his internship at Maalaimalar, a Tam-il eveninger from the group, he is credited with establishing Hello FM and Thanthi TV, and making them successful.

RAMESH CHANDRA AGARWALChairman, DB Corp LtdHe is at the helm of Dainik Bhaskar group of newspapers which has presence in al-most all Indian cities and all major Hindi speaking states. He has more than four decades of experience in the publishing and newspaper business. Recently, the group has also diversifi ed into other me-dia verticals.

MAHENDRA MOHAN GUPTAChairman, Jagran PrakashanHe is at the helm of the largest circulated Hindi dailies in the country. The fl agship newspaper, Dainik Jagran, has gradually climbed up the ladder of success with over 200 editions and about 30 publishing centres having a whopping readership of about 5.5 crores. The group has plans to diversify into radio and television.

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UDAY SHANKARCEO, Star India

SANJAY GUPTACOO, Star India

BIREN GHOSE Country Head for India, Technicolor

TEHCNICOLOR INDIAGhose is a rare combination of creativity and business leadership in one person. As the country head of Technicolour, he has expanded the company’s India operations in such a way that he could open up thousands of new jobs to anima-tion and visual effects. No one mar-kets India as passionately as Biren, and at the same time contributing his time to the growth of locally-produced animation.

EXECUTIVE POWER


STAR INDIA‘The more you invest, the more you grow...’ That’s the success mantra of Uday Shankar who has taken the organisation to new heights in his ninth con-secutive year as the chief ex-ecutive. Star India is the largest investor in the entertainment sector in India. This being achieved by a journalist is com-mendable. Operationally aided by equally brilliant Star India’s COO Sanjay Gupta, this combo is a rarity in the media sector -- and also in corporate leader-ship. But it is yet not clear why they decided to put all their money into sports and little into entertainment.



SUDHANSHUDesign

RAJ NAYAKDesign

VIACOM 18xxxxxxxxxxxThe infl uence of Aveek Sarkar, Kolkatabased media baron and chief editor of the Anandabazar Group of Publications, is not limited to the newspapers, maga-zines and television channels that he owns. It extends into the cultural sphere. Anandabazar Patrika, the group’s fl agship is one of the most widely read dailies in India. It reaches virtually every Bengali-speaking home and sways public choices in the do-

NAME DesignRAHUL JOSHI CEO, News,

Network18 Media

NETWORK 18Rahul Joshi, who is at the helm of Net-work 18, has brought the much-needed stability to the shacked up company. All eyes are now on him to fi nd out how the news factory would shape up post the Reliance Jio launch with an integrated mobile and TV newsroom. But it is for sure that news via mobile will reach far fl ung places where newspapers cannot penetrate.

VIACOM 18 MEDIA

SUDHANSHU VATSGroup CEO Viacom18 Media Pvt. Ltd

RAJ NAYAKCEO, Colors Channel


In less than three years, Sudhanshu Vats as the group CEO of Viacom 18 has successfully led the group into a profi table growth phase while expand-ing the channel network, driving content-led cinema and entering expe-riential entertainment across genres at the same time.

Colors -- the fl agship money spinner among all other group verticals ever since its launch -- has continued to have audience on its side. Raj is among very few CEOs who have witnessed the growth of television for over two de-cades and continue to innovate to keep audience engaged with the channel.

SIDDHARTH ROY KAPURMD, Walt Disney Company India

DISNEY INDIAAs the managing director of the Walt Disney Company India, Siddharth has taken on the mantle of driving the strat-egy and growth for it in one of its most important markets. The India business for Walt Disney spans across broadcast-ing, movies, consumer products and licensing, interactive, digital and games sectors through multiple brands namely Disney, UTV, Bindass, Marvel, Indiag-ames, Lucas, Pixar and ABC.


AMIT KHANNA

A media and entertain-ment futurist, he be-lieves that immersive technology is going to be the driving force for the next decade and the next generation inter-net is about customisa-tion and curation. Most of his time is now spent in research for his on-going encyclopaedia project tracing the His-tory of Indian Media & Entertainment.

SAM BALSARA

One of the pioneers and thought leaders in Indian advertising, he has seen it and done it all in his nearly four de-cades old career. He has worked with companies like Sarabhai, Cadbury, Contract Advertising and Mudra Communi-cations before starting Madison in 1988. Under his guidance, Madi-son today has 26 units across 11 specialized functions.

PRASOON JOSHIA brand builder, this ad-vertising and communi-cation specialist is also a prolifi c writer, who has penned 4 books — the fi rst one coming out when he was just 17. He has been twice selected for the prestigious Na-tional Award by the President of India. Win-ning laurels for his work at Cannes, D&Ad, Clio, Media, Adfest, and pleth-ora of others, he is a house-hold name which is deeply respected.

THOUGHT LEADERS

SHYAM-BENEGALHe is Hindi cinema’s most respected elder statesman. His fi rst four fi lms – ‘Ankur’, ‘Nishant’, ‘Manthan’ and ‘Bhumika’, all made in the 1970s – marked the birth of the parallel cinema in Mumbai. The Dadasaheb Phalke Award winner currently heads the commit-tee appointed by the I&B Ministry to suggest ways to revamp the fi lm censorship system in the country.

ASHOK MANSUKHANIOver four decades in the media space, his valuable insights to the industry makes him the walking en-cyclopaedia of media regulation in the country. An ardent supporter of new technologies, he has his focus fi xed on emerging digitisation of cable and is presently whole-time director of M/s. Hinduja Ventures Limited.




SANOTOSH DESAIHe is a leading ad pro-fessional and heads Future Brands. An out-of-box thinker, his thought leadership in understanding the re-lationship between cul-ture, brands and con-sumer as a product is refl ected in his weekly columns.

PIYUSH PANDEYAd guru Piyush Pan-dey’s infl uence is his simplicity. He says in his own words: Keep it simple. Flesh out a complicated brief into a simple idea. And com-municate from your heart. It should come from your heart and touch the heart.

NEERAJ ROY

A digital pioneer, he is managing director of Hungama Digital Media – the largest digital me-dia company in South Asia – and a fi rm believ-er in the spurt of digi-tal consumption in the next one or two years. He has given a clarion call to the regulator to block access to 200 odd pirate sites which will result in monetisation for companies.


ARUNA HAR PRASADEstablishing KAS Mov-ie Makers with Kalyan Mukherjee in 1988, she pioneered the path of production companies in India and mastermind-ed more than 500 shoots. With offi ces in Delhi and Goa, KAS has been pro-ducing documentaries, feature fi lms and com-mercials. After working on several international feature fi lms, she contin-ues to cheerlead India as a dramatic shooting lo-cation in the world.

ASHISH S K

Ashish S K has taken the major task to work with various state governments & I&B Ministry to formulate an effective industry-friendly policy for ani-mation, visual effects, gaming and comics (AVGC) sector. A fi rm believer in the Indian IP creation, he has his ambition set to create Mary Com Jr, the fi rst girl super hero.

S RAGHUNATH

One of the leading au-thorities in manage-ment strategy, the post doctoral fellow from Stanford, has predicted the explosive growth of Indian media and strat-egies needed to succeed in the 21st century. He has done extensive re-search on the Indian M&E industry with specifi c focus on sus-taining high growth through value innova-tion.


BUSINESSMAVENS


KARAN JOHARProducer, Dharma ProductionsHe has delivered monster hits like ‘Kuch Kuch Hota Hai’, ‘Kabhi Alvida Na Kehna’ and ‘Kabhi Khushi Kabhie Gham’ in his more than two decade old career. His ban-ner, Dharma Production, is among the in-dustry’s top players. He has produced sev-eral fi lms directed by former assistants. Recently, the producer-director featured in a major role in Anurag Kashyap’s ‘Bombay Velvet’.

KISHORE LULLAChairman, Eros InternationalKishore Lulla’s Eros has been spearhead-ing India’s soft power in creating a global platform for Indian cinema by presenting it in 50 countries. It is the fi rst Indian me-dia company to raise capital and be listed on the New York Stock Exchange. Eros is set to co-produce four fi lms with two Chi-nese studios over the next three years.

PUNIT GOENKACEO, ZEELPunit Goenka has been professionally man-aging ZEEL — one of India’s leading tele-vision M&E companies. It is amongst the largest producers and aggregators of Hindi programming in the world with an exten-sive library housing over 210,000 hours of television content and rights of more than 3,500 movie titles. Through its strong pres-ence worldwide, ZEEL entertains over 959 million viewers across 169 countries.


N. RAMChairman, Kasturi & Sons Ltd. Kasturi & Sons Ltd (KLS Media) owns The Hindu, one of the reputed and lead-ing newspapers in the country. Known for strong editorial values, The Hindu Group now has a Tamil daily in the same name, Business Line, Sports Star and Front-line. The family-owned company, whose bosses are strong in both editorial and administration, is making its presence in the web too.

MAMMEN MATHEWChief Editor & MD, Malayala ManoramaHailed as the most read daily newspa-per in Malayalam, it started as a weekly more than a century ago. It currently has a readership of over 20 million. Mammen Mathew is present Chief Editor and Man-aging Director of Malayala Manorama. He is one of the senior most journalists in In-dia with 46 years of experience. He served as president of the Editors Guild of India and the Indian Newspaper Society.

RAJAT SHARMAChairman, Editor-in-Chief, India TVA prominent and infl uential media owner, Rajat Sharma is the chairman of Hindi news channel, India TV. He is best known for his show ‘Aap Ki Adalat’. He has been a familiar face on TV for over two decades. Before joining television, he was the Editor of Onlooker, SundayOb-server and The Daily. Currently, he is the president of the News Broadcasters Asso-ciation of India (NBA).

RAMOJI RAOFounder and Chairman, Ramoji GroupA leading media and entertainment en-trepreneur, Ramoji Rao gave Indian cin-ema a new outlook in terms of its outdoor locations. He founded Ramoji Film City, the largest fi lm production facility in the world and also one of South India’s most popular tourism and recreation centres. He established Eenadu group of newspa-pers and TV channels.


RAGHAV BAHLCo-Founder, Quintillion MediaAfter exiting Network 18, Raghav Bahl co-founded Quintillion Media Pvt Ltd with wife Ritu. A television journalist-turned-media entrepreneur, Bahl’s new venture shows all signs of success in the digital news media. Media reports doing rounds suggest that he is set to tie up with Bloomberg to develop digital video prop-erties. Only time will tell whether he will return back to news broadcast business.

RAJJAT A. BARJATYAManaging Director & CEO, Rajshri EntertainmentHis company is India’s leading digital enter-tainment studio. It is the new media arm of the 68-year- old Rajshri group, one of India’s oldest, largest and most successful fi lm and TV studios. Barjatya has turned around the company’s digital media arm as its most successful venture, which users worldwide consume entertainment content on-demand anytime, anywhere and on any device!

JAWAHAR GOELChairman, DISH TVGoel is India’s fi rst DTH service provider launching Dish TV as an alternative to a cable connection. He is a wizard in satel-lite and cable distribution business and technology and very few people can match his knowledge in cable, DTH and emerging new media tech. Always innovative, Dish TV’s breakthrough product on Dish on Wheels provides innovation in TV view-ing on the move through mobile dish.

ADITYA CHOPRAProducer, YRF FilmsHe is the chairman of Yash Raj Films (YRF), which is regarded as Bollywood’s biggest banner known for consistently churning out blockbusters. Chopra as a director and screenwriter has helmed three fi lms in over two decades – ‘Dilwale Dulhaniya Le Jayenge’, ‘Mohabbatein’ and ‘Rab Ne Bana Di Jodi’ — all of which took the box offi ce by storm. He is now making a comeback as a director with ‘Befi kre’.


SAJID NADIAWALAHProducerA prolifi c mainstream producer, he made his directorial debut in 2014 with the Sal-man Khan starrer Kick. His fi lmography is dominated by commercially-oriented action dramas and slapstick comedies. He has also funded the fi lms of directors like Imtiaz Ali (‘Highway’ and ‘Tamasha’). One of his upcoming productions is the Vishal Bhardwaj-directed period drama Rangoon.

MADHU MANTENAProducer, Phantom FilmsMantena is among the most successful entrepreneurs known in the business today. He has built a media entity with various companies operating across the entertainment and media verticals, with each specializing in talent management, content development, content production and content distribution. He is master craftsman in nurturing talent and co-owns talent agency Kwan.

BHUSHAN KUMARChairman, T SeriesTaking reins from his father, the late Gulshan Kumar, Bhushan Kumar turned around T-Series into one of the most suc-cessful music and fi lm companies of In-dia. With his impeccable knack for music, drive and determination, he set new limits for T-Series to achieve growth. Today the music company is not only into acquiring soundtracks, but also new media revenue streams along with producing movies.

RAMAN MAROOMD, Shemaroo EntertainmentHe is the guiding force behind Shemaroo Entertainment, which is one of India’s most reputable names in the digital con-tent aggregation space. He helped his brother run a book library in 1974 and established India’s fi rst video library in 1987 and today leads Shemaroo’s journey in the digital highway. Privately held for decades, Shemaroo has had a successful IPO in 2014 and going strong.


AJAY BIJILIOwner, PVR CinemasAjay Bijli is the man behind the multiplex revolution in India. He has transformed the movie-watching experience of In-dians with his chain of PVR Cinemas. From fi ve screens in 1997, PVR Cinemas today has nearly 60 million patrons, 501 screens, 111 properties in 45 cities across the country.

SANJAY GAIKWADMD, UFO MoviezUFO Moviez is India’s largest digital cin-ema distribution network and in-cinema advertising platform in terms of number of screens. UFO operates India’s largest satellite-based, digital cinema distribution network using its UFO-M4 platform, as well as India’s largest D-Cinema network. They have so far enabled release of over 10,000 fi lms in 22 languages and conducted over 21 million shows till 18th December, 2015.

SENTHIL KUMARCo-founder, Real Image and Qube CinemaChennai-based Real Image Media Tech-nologies has pioneered several technol-ogy revolutions over the last 30-odd years. With its Qube Cinema end-to-end digital cinema product line, Real Image has made an impact worldwide. The company has found ways to cut 80 percent cost in releas-ing a fi lm. The one question that always comes to mind is why Qube has not gone public.

EKTA KAPOORJoint MD, Balaji Telefi lmsAptly called the reigning queen of the Indian television, everyone is hoping her to recreate the magic in digital formats. Balaji Telefi lms has built a SVOD plat-form, ALT Balaji, which is scheduled for launch later this year. It is set to offer 300 hours of original programming. The company is professionally run by Group CEO Samir Nair, a well-known media pro-fessional.


SURESH BABUProducer. Suresh ProductionsSon of veteran producer D Ramanaidu, Dag-gubati Suresh Babu runs the highly success-ful Suresh Productions. Having bankrolled most of his younger brother and popular actor Venkatesh’s movies, Suresh has sev-eral blockbusters to his credit, including the recent Gopala Gopala and Drushyam. His son Rana Daggubati shot to fame as the menacing ‘Bhallala Deva’ in last year’s magnum opus Baahubali: The Beginning.

SABBAS JOSEPHDirector, Wizcraft InternationalAlong with Andre Timmins and Viraf Sarkari, Joseph launched the IIFA awards (by Wizcraft International) to promote In-dian cinema globally and use its softpower to reach out to millions. That was 15 years back. Now IFFA property has mastered the craft taking it throughout the globe. IIFA creates momentum for Indian cin-ema globally and spreads the country’s creative might in the showbiz sector.

SANJAY WADHWAMD, AP InternationalHe knows the pulse of distribution of South Indian fi lms in the international market, especially in Asian region. The managing director of AP International is credited to have created space for Tamil and Malayalam movies in the overseas market. His company has the largest fi lm software for new digital media.

P SATHYANARAYANANFounder, Puthiya ThalaimuraiHe ventured into the media business with Puthiya Thalaimurai magazine and then with a television channel, penning a new chapter in Tamil news channels’ history with its news and views. He successfully laid to rest any apprehension that people might have about him repeating the suc-cess of his father-led SRM empire in many fi elds, especially education. The rest, as they say, is history.


V A SHRIKUMARMD & CEO, Push Integrated CommunicationsHe has over two decades of experience in the fi eld of advertising and communica-tion. He has been solely responsible for the turnaround of brands like Kalyan Jewellers Manappuram Gold Loan. For the fi rst time, Push will manage UDF Party in the forthcoming state election in Kerala.

TAPAAS CHAKRAVARTI,Chairman, DQ EntertainmentHe has over two decades of international corporate management experience and has helped to shape the success story of his creation DQ Entertainment group. No other Indian media and entertainment company would be engaged in European co-production activities as is being driv-en by Tapaas. He champions India in the global markets.

RAJIV CHILAKALAPUDICEO, Green GoldGreen Gold Animation is an industry pioneer and has to its credit many origi-nal properties, including hugely popular animation show “ Chhota Bheem”. With over 13,000 minutes of quality animation content, their shows and movies draw an active daily viewership of close to 40 mil-lion kids on TV.


ICONS


SHAH RUKH KHANActorThe ‘Badshah of Bollywood’, as he is lov-ingly called by his fans, the megastar made inroads into our minds by playing some unforgettable romantic roles in his nearly 25 years of career. His rise in the Hindi fi lm industry also signifi es begin-ning of a new era, where an actor could venture into less-explored areas — like he did in ‘Swades’ and ‘Chak De India’.

AMITABH BACHCHANActorHe is Hindi cinema’s longest serving su-perstar with phenomenal following. In a career spanning almost half a century, he has infl uenced entire generations of fans. With the time the megastar has essayed a wide variety of awe-inspiring roles set-ting a benchmark for other actors to fol-low. He is loved by the public not only for his on screen persona but also for his humbleness.

RAJINIKANTHActorHe is currently the highest-paid movie actor in India. Although seen mainly in Tamil fi lms, his fame transcends geo-graphical boundaries. The hugely popu-lar larger-than-life heroes that he plays on the screen, makes him the country’s most bankable movie star. He enjoys al-most God-like status amongst his fans, who love his inimitable mannerisms and fl ashy dialogue delivery.


CHIRANJEEVIActorTollywood’s very own ‘angry young man’ of the 1980s, Chiranjeevi is one of Indian cinema’s biggest superstars. Redefi ning commercial cinema, Chiranjeevi had mesmerized an entire generation of mov-iegoers. He is now all set to return with his 150th fi lm. His son, Ram Charan Teja, who entered fi lmdom in 2007, is now an accomplished actor and a successful en-trepreneur.

KAMALHASSANActorThe multi-talented actor is known for his bold experiments and playing characters that go beyond the conventional. Also a successful screenwriter and director, his work is keenly followed by cineastes. One of India’s most awarded fi lm actors his ventures attract nationwide attention on account of their unusual approaches to storytelling.

AAMIR KHANActorThe high quality mass entertainer has broken the mould of the formula narra-tive rut. His last release, PK, is the big-gest box-offi ce grosser ever in the history of Hindi cinema. The host of Satyamev Jayate TV show was able to successfully mix entertainment with social cause, making him one of the most revered art-ists of our times.

MAMOOTYActorA force to reckon with in contemporary Malayalam cinema, he came into the limelight in 1980 with his fi rst starring role in the fi lm Mela. Since then, he has been part of some of the most acclaimed Malayalam fi lms of the last 30 years. He has over the years acted in fi lms in the Tamil, Telugu, Kannada and Hindi lan-guages as well.


GULZARWriter, LyricistThe lyricist, poet and fi lmmaker shared one of the two Oscars that A.R. Rahman bagged for ‘Jai Ho’ in 2009. But his claim to fame does not by any means rests on that golden statuette. The much-respected Mumbai movie industry fi gure wrote his fi rst song in the early 1960s and made his fi rst fi lm (Mere Apne) in 1971. He contin-ues to be an integral part of the industry.

A R RAHMANComposerThe Mozart of Madras has redefi ned In-dian fi lm music by combining the strains of traditional Eastern classical sounds with infl uences borrowed and absorbed from around the world. The Oscar and Grammy-winning music composer has, over the past two decades and a bit, blazed a trail like no one else. ‘Jai Ho’ in Danny Boyle’s Slumdog Millionaire fetched him two Academy Awards.

MOHANLALActorAbout a decade younger than Mammootty, the impressively versatile Mohanlal made his mark as a lead actor in the same year as the latter, 1980. By the mid-1980s, he had attained superstar status. He has featured in over 320 fi lms. Among Mohanlal’s best known screen roles is that of a kathakali artist plagued by personal setbacks in Shaji N Karun’s Vanaprastham.

ADOOR GOPALAKRISHNANDirectorThe fastidious fi lmmaker has steadfastly operated outside the confi nes of the com-mercial movie industry, crafting master-pieces that stand the test of time. He led the new wave in Malayalam cinema. In the 44 years that have elapsed since his debut, he has directed only ten fi lms, but each of them has achieved cult status.

RAJAMOULI

He dreams big. Going where his imagination takes him, he pulls out the stops in the execu-tion of his grand cin-ematic vision. The ‘hit’ director tag sits pretty on him. With his last outing, Baahubali – The Beginning, he too the fantasy action epic genre to a completely different plane aided by eye-popping CG imagery. Audiences can barely wait for part two of the Baahubali experience!

KANGANA RANAUTShe has steadily risen up the Bollywood ranks without the crutches of the industry’s big male box-offi ce powerhouses. With heroine-centric fi lms like ‘Tanu Weds Manu’ and ‘Queen’ un-der her belt, Kangana is perceived as an ac-tress capable of carry-ing an entire fi lm on her slender shoulders. Up ahead for the fans of the actress is the Vishal Bhardwaj period ro-mance ‘Rangoon’.

MANISH MUNDRAA fi lm producer by acci-dent, he has an unfailing eye for cinematic gems. A tweet by actor-director Rajat Kapoor express-ing his frustration at not fi nding funds for ‘Ank-hon Dekhi’ caught his attention and he offered to produce the critically acclaimed fi lm. Since then this one-time soft drinks seller in Deoghar, Jharkhand, has backed extraordinary fi lms like ‘Umrika’, ‘Dhanak’, ‘Masaan’ and ‘Waiting’.

PATH BREAKERS

Q (QAUSHIQ MUKHERJEE)An irrepressible agent provocateur, Kolkata-based Q is known the world over for his controversial cult fi lm, ‘Gandu’. He has since adapted a Rabindranath Tagore dance drama, ‘Tasher Desh’, into a typically revisionist fi lm; ‘Nabarun’, a documentary on the late Bengali litterateur Nabarun Bhattacharya; and the horror fi lm ‘Ludo’.

VETRIMAARANSince 2007, he has just three fi lms to his credit. But his all three (‘Polladhavan’, ‘Aadukalam’ and the recent ‘Visaranai’) directorial ventures have left a huge impact in Tamil cinema, besides catapulting him into the league of India’s most respected fi lm-makers. His approach to fi lmmaking is marked by a rare level of meticulousness.



RESUL POOKUTTYThis envelope-pushing sound designer and edi-tor has won an Oscar and BAFTA award for his work on Danny Boyle’s ‘Slumdog Millionaire’. In a career spanning al-most two decades, he has collaborated with direc-tors like Sanjay Leela Bhansali, Rajkumar Hi-rani and Imtiaz Ali and has also worked on the sound design of block-busters like ‘Ghajini’, ‘Enthiran’ and ‘Ra.One’.

UMESH KULKARNIThis FTII alumnus is one of the fi nest Mara-thi fi lmmakers of his generation. He directed several acclaimed short fi lms before making his fi rst feature fi lm, ‘Valu’ (The Wild Bull). His fi lms, steeped in the ethos of Maharashtra and informed with a deeply personal vision, are lucid comments on social and cultural is-sues of the times.

ANURAG KASHYAPThe inspiration behind many young directors to push the boundaries of Mumbai’s independent cinema, he is continues to challenge the hege-mony of Bollywood, eschewing entertain-ment—fantasy, pleasure, happy endings—and offering instead harsh and edgy stories about life in contemporary society. His fi lms make him stand apart.

VARUN GROVERThis gifted stand-up comedian, lyricist and screenwriter is a talent that stands apart from the crowd with the sheer uniqueness of his out-put. Besides writing lyr-ics for ‘Gangs of Wassey-pur’, ‘Ankhon Dekhi’ and ‘Dum Laga Ke Haisha’, he scripted Neeraj Ghay-wan’s ‘Masaan’, which garnered accolades in Cannes last year. Grover has written lyrics for the upcoming SRK Film, ‘Fan’.

AMIT DUTTA

He is probably India’s best-known fi lmmaker globally. But ironically, he is barely known in India. But that isn’t sur-prising. He is a fi ercely independent fi lmmaker who lives in the hills and makes rigorous fi lms about zones of ex-perience and conscious-ness. His fi lms have few parallels in Indian cinema.

SANAL KUMAR SASIDHARANA lawyer by training and a passionate fi lm soci-ety activist, he made his directorial debut in 2014 with the crowd-funded ‘Oraalpokkam’ based on man’s indiscriminate assaults on the environ-ment. He followed it with ‘An Off-Day Game’, a dis-turbing look at caste dy-namics in Kerala against the backdrop of an elec-tion. His third fi lm, a so-cial satire provocatively titled ‘Sexy Durga’, is al-ready in the making.



MEGAENTERTAINERS


DEEPIKA PADUKONEActorDebuting in 2007 with ‘Om Shanti Om’, she took a while to fi nd her footing in the industry. She came into her own in fi lms like ‘Cocktail’, ‘Yeh Jawaani Hai Deewani’ and ‘Chennai Express’. Her transformation into a dependable actress was complete in ‘Piku’ and Bajirao-Mas-tani. She will be seen next sharing screen space with Van Diesel in the Hollywood fi lm XXX: The Return of Xander Cage.

SALMAN KHANActorA Bollywood crowd-puller who has no peer, he thrives on the loyalty of his fans. No matter what kind of fi lm he acts in, they pack the movie halls and ensure bumper collections. His previous release, Sooraj Barjatya’s ‘Prem Ratan Dhan Paayo’, which saw the star make a departure from his action-hero persona, mopped up a neat pile at the box offi ce. Bollywood cannot do without him.

PRIYANKA CHOPRAActorThe fi rst Asian actress to play a lead role in an American television series, she is steadily building on the breakthrough. The actress has now been cast as the bad-die in the fi lm version of ‘Baywatch’, fea-turing Dwayne Johnson and Zac Efron in key roles. The past year and a half saw her transformation complete with breathtak-ing performances in ‘Mary Kom’ and ‘Dil Dhadakne Do’


AKSHAY KUMARActorOne of Bollywood’s most bankable stars, he is a prolifi c actor who has featured in over a hundred feature fi lms in a career spanning a quarter century. He specia-lises in action fi lms and comedies, but has also, in recent rimes, made a mark with dramas like ‘Special 26’ and ‘Airlift’, which was released earlier this year to an enthusiastic reception.

RANVEER SINGHActorMaking his acting debut in the 2010 roman-tic comedy ‘Band Baaja Baaraat’, the 30-year-old quickly established himself as a box of-fi ce force. Although some of his fi lms may not have lived up to expectations in commer-cial terms, the two fi lms that Ranveer has done with Sanjay Leela Bhansali – ‘Goliyon Ki Rasleela Ram-Leela’ and ‘Bajirao Mas-tani’ – have enabled to pull ahead of other Bollywood actors of his generation.

AJAY DEVGNActorAn actor who made the transition from being an out-and-out acting star to bag-ging National Awards for his performanc-es in fi lms like ‘Zakhm’ and ‘The Legend of Bhagat Singh’, he has over the years starred in fi lms virtually of every genre. He continues to be a major box offi ce draw. In recent years, many of his releases have been commercial successes. He is also a producer and director.

HRITHIK ROSHANActorHe is one of Bollywood’s most saleable su-perstars. Known especially for his danc-ing skills, he has acted in the superhero fi lm franchise ‘Koi… Mil Gaya’, ‘Krrish’ and ‘Krrish 3’. Besides featuring in the period fi lm ‘Jodhaa Akbar’ in the role of the Mughal emperor, he has achieved success in both action fi lms and romantic and social dramas.


AJITH KUMARActorCarving his own destiny, he remains box-offi ce king for more than a decade. ‘Thala’ (head) to his fans, theatres turn festival grounds whenever a fi lm of his releases and traffi c jams on roads housing cinema halls are a common scenario. Despite his stature in Tamil cinema, he is extremely humble and always open to do something awe-inspiring that other celebrities might not consider doing.

SURIYAActorHe might have come to the fi eld with the tag of Sivakumar’s son. But his growth is certainly not because of it. Suriya equipped himself as an actor par excel-lence with his dedication, sincerity and hard work. Groomed by the likes of di-rectors Bala and Ameer, he is now one of the top stars of Tamil cinema, who has a bankable, and enviable, box-offi ce and per-formance record.

DHANUSHActorDhanush won a National Award at a very young age. Though a performer par excel-lence, he has left a mark on the box-offi ce too. His fi lms (such as ‘VIP’, ‘Polladhavan’ and ‘Anegan’) set the cash registers ring-ing. A lyric writer, or ‘poetu’ in his style, the song ‘Why this kolaveri...’ penned by him went viral all over the world. He made his presence felt in Bollywood through ‘Raanjhanaa’.

VIJAYActorOne of the few front-runners to the nu-mero uno slot of Tamil cinema, Vijay has his own box-offi ce records. He has carved a niche for himself with colourful com-mercial entertainers and has a faithful fan following among the youth. Even in his 40s, his dance movements remain un-matched by even those in their 20s. ‘Ilaya Thalapathi’ to fans, Vijay is successfully marching towards his 60th movie.


MAHESH BABUActorA combination of good looks and innate talent, Mahesh Babu is box offi ce dyna-mite. Son of yesteryears superstar Krish-na, Mahesh, referred to as ‘Prince’ by his fans, is a principal reason why Telugu cin-ema enjoys a huge overseas market today. A philanthropist and the voice of several public service campaigns, Mahesh’s pop-ularity soared to an all-time high, after he adopted a village in Andhra Pradesh.

JUNIOR NTRActorA scion of the famed Nandamuri clan, Tarak Rama Rao’s entry into tinsel town was inevi-table. But little did the industry know that this was to be no ordinary journey of a star kid. Junior NTR, as he is popularly called, has time and again wowed the audience with his on-screen exploits. A dancer par excel-lence and an actor who breathes life to any character, Tarak is today one of the most sought-after leading men in Telugu cinema.

AKKINENI NAGARJUNAActorNagarjuna, is a rare actor of the last gen-eration who is still a force. Son of veteran actor Nageswara Rao, he, with consecutive hits, continues to give the current crop of actors a run for their money. He and his wife, popular actress Amala, are referred to as the industry’s ‘power couple’. Na-garjuna’s sons Naga Chaitanya and Akhil Akkineni made their movie debuts as solo leads in 2009 and 2015 respectively.

NAYANTARAActorFrom a humble beginning in ‘Ayya’, the growth story of Nayanthara begs to be made a case study for aspiring actresses. Despite being in hibernation for some time, she made it to the top again, not just in Tamil cinema, but also in Telugu and Malayalam industries. Her colleagues hail for her simplicity, sincerity and pro-fessionalism, the three ingredients that are apparently the secrets of her success.


PAWAN KALYANActorPawan Kalyan is one of South India’s big-gest movie superstars. Starting out two decades back as the younger brother of actor Chiranjeevi, he has carved out his own magnifi cent niche, earning a huge, committed fan following. Known to be a producer’s actor, Kalyan is also a martial arts expert, choreographer and stunt co-ordinator.

DEVActorThe highest paid movie actor of Bengal is also a Trinamool Congress Member of Parliament. Although he made his debut in 2006 with ‘Agnishapath’, his second fi lm, ‘I Love You’, produced by Shree Venkatesh Films, set him on the path to super-star-dom. On the back of hits like ‘Challenge’, ‘Paglu’, ‘Romeo’, ‘Khokhababu’ and ‘Chal-lenge 2’, he has become one of Bengali commercial cinema’s most bankable stars.

PROSENJIT CHATTERJEEActorFew actors in the history of cinema in Bengal have had as long and as fruitful an innings as him. Since featuring in the cast of Rituparno Ghosh’s ‘Chokher Bali’, he turned his attention to artistically mean-ingful fi lms, many of which have gone on to win big at the National Awards, includ-ing Srijit Mukherji’s ‘Jaatishwar’ and Rit-uparno Ghosh’s ‘Dosar’.

APARNA SENActorMaking her acting debut in Satyajit Ray’s ‘Teen Kanya’, she has been one of Bengal’s most abiding cultural icons. She went on to build a hugely successful career as a director with fi lms like ‘36 Chowringhee Lane’, which paved the way for a series of acclaimed cinematic essays. She con-tinues to appear occasionally in fi lms, as she did in Srijit Mukherji’s ‘Chatuskone’ in 2014.


IRRFAN KHANActorHe is widely regarded as one of India’s fi nest actors. Known for his understated approach to acting for the camera, he is a National School of Drama graduate. In 2001, his per-formance in British director Asif Kapadia’s ‘The Warrior’ fetched him global atten-tion. He hasn’t looked back since. Among his best-known fi lms are ‘The Namesake’, ‘Slumdog Millionaire’, ‘Life of Pi’, ‘Paan Singh Tomar’ and ‘The Lunchbox’.

S SHANKARDirectorHe dreams big, thinks big and makes big things with consummate ease and elan. In Tamil cinema’s dictionary, the word ‘grandeur’ means Shankar. From ‘Gentle-man’ to ‘I’, his fi lms set new trends in Kol-lywood in terms of budget and collection. He is currently busy with ‘2.0’, starring Rajinikanth and Akshay Kumar. The fi lm is tipped to be the costliest ever movie in Indian cinema.

A.R. MURUGADOSSDirectorA youngster with full of dreams in his eyes, A R Murugadoss made his debut in cinema with the Ajith-starrer ‘Dheena’. Since then, success is the only thing he has tasted, be it Kollywood (‘Ramana’, ‘Thupakki’ etc), Tollywood (‘Stalin’, ‘Tagore’) or Bollywood (‘Ghajini’). In as-sociation with 20th Century Fox, he also produces movies and focuses on backing young and promising talent.

ROHIT SHETTYDirectorSon of character actor and action director Shetty, Rohit Shetty is among the Mumbai movie industry’s most successful hit mak-ers. His potboilers aimed at the masses never fail to mop up big box-offi ce returns. He has delivered a string of hits since he stumbled upon the money-spinning ‘Gol-maal’ franchise in 2006. Since then, Rohit has made two more ‘Golmaal’ comedies as well as ‘Singham’ and ‘Singham 2’.


SANJAY LEELA BHANSALIDirectorGrandeur is the keyword in Sanjay Leela Bhansali’s cinematic vision. With sweep-ing epics like Hum Dil De Chuke Sanam, Devdas, Goliyon Ki Rasleela Ram-Leela and Bajirao Mastani under his belt, he enjoys the reputation of being a fi lmmak-er who paints on big canvases and nar-rates larger-than-life tales. Bhansali has also made Hindi fi lms that have sought to break the established commercial mould.

KAPIL SHARMAStand-up comedian, actor, TV hostHe is a comedian and television show host who was the face of the super-successful ‘Comedy Nights with Kapil Sharma’. He has transformed himself as one of In-dia’s biggest showbiz stars outside of the mainstream movie industry. A new TV show hosted by him —‘The Kapil Sharma Show’ – is due to go on air on Sony in the third week of April.

VISHAL BHARDWAJDirectorHe is one of Bollywood’s more adventur-ous directors and works with narrative raw material that demands auteur-like control. As a screenwriter and director, he has crafted several thought-provoking fi lms that refl ect a mind that is clued into both classic literature and contemporary reality. He is best known for his Shake-speare trilogy – ‘Maqbool’, ‘Omkara’ and ‘Haider’.

RAJKUMAR HIRANIDirectorBlending commercial viability with an individualistic sensibility, the writer-director-editor has delivered a string of megahits since making Munnabhai MBBS in 2003. He has since helmed fi lms such as Lage Raho Munnabhai, 3 Idiots and PK, each one of a huge box offi ce hit. His career has moved only one way – up, up and away.


VENKATESH FILMSProducerTwo men who have been major game-changers in contemporary Bengali cinema are cousins Shrikant Mohta and Mahendra Soni, the brains behind Shree Venkatesh Films (SVF), an inte-grated M&D company. Described as the YRF ofBengal, their banner produces movies, TV shows and music. Not a year passes without SVF fi guring on the roll-call of the National Awards.

AYANANKA BOSEDOPThe director of photography has had a meteoric rise in Bollywood in the past decade. One of the busiest cine-matographers in the world of TV com-mercials, he trained under director and cameraman Rajiv Menon. After serving as an assistant on the sets of ‘Dil Chahta Hai’ and ‘Kannathil Muth-amittal’, he then went on to earn his spurs as an independent DOP.

SONAM KAPOORActorOnce seen largely as a style icon known more for her fashion statements than her fi lm roles, she has evolved into an actress of substance in her own right with the success of her latest release, ‘Neerja’, the story of a real-life fl ight attendant who died fi ghting terrorists aboard a PanAm aircraft. Her previous release, Prem Ratan Dhan Paayo, star-ring Salman Khan, was a commercial success.

THENANDAL FILMSDistributor, ProducerIf Sri Thenandal Films is now a re-spected name in international fi lm markets, it’s because of Murali. Son of late director-producer Rama Narayanan, he acquired the hot seat after his father’s demise and since then, there is no looking back. Murali not just knows the knack of acquiring and bankrolling the right movies, but also to market them globally.

EMERGINGPLAYERS



CHU CHU TVYouTube ChannelChuChu TV is one of the most pop-ular YouTube channels catering to kids. Since debuting in early 2013, CHU CHU TV has racked up mil-lions of subscribers and billions of views for its videos, which aim to en-gage and educate children through colourful animations, set to well-known nursery rhymes and upbeat original songs.

OGLEVideo Streaming Ogle is India’s premium on-demand entertainment service. Ogle stream-ing service comes with features such as buffer-less and ad-free streaming. It enables online streaming across various connected devices and also caters to low bandwidth issues. It provides an array of online content across genres.

YUPP TVVideo Streaming YuppTV is one of the world’s leading Over-The-Top (OTT) South Asian content providers. Founded in 2006, YuppTV started with two channels and has grown to deliver more than 200+ TV Channels today. YuppTV is accessible on more than 25 internet enabled - Connected Vs, Internet STBs, smart Blu-ray players, PCs, smartphones and tablets.

MOBIOTICSOTTMobiotics offers white-labelled OTT technology platform to broadcasters, operators, and content producers to launch their own OTT TV and TV Everywhere services globally. Built using the best of cloud and mobile technologies, the solution is custom-izable, scalable and reliable while providing the best in class user expe-rience across devices.

YoBoHoHITENDRA MERCHANT Founder and CEO

YoBoHo is the world’s no. 1 digital-fi rst content producer for kids, and home to the massively popular Hooplakidz brand. YoBoHo is now part of BroadbandTV (BBTV), which puts the Hooplakidz brand along-side the company’s key media brands. YoBoHo generates a total of three billion views per year.

NAZARA TECHNOLOGIESNITISH MITTERSAIN Managing Director

Nazara is a leading mo-bile games developer and publisher focused on the huge mobile consumer base in India and world-wide. In ad-dition to developing a range of branded and original mobile games, the company operates unique services such as ‘Games Club’.

NAAGAA ENTERTAINMENTV. NAAGARAJANCEO

Naagaa Entertainment Media Pvt Ltd is a Chen-nai-based fi rm and is one of the leading media syndication businesses in India catering to the content requirement needs of international television channels. The company has dedicated-ly built and consolidated its reputation as a highly reliable entity.


RAVI VARMANCinematographerHe wears many hats, one of which is that of a writer of Tamil fi ction and non-fi ction. But his popularity rests primarily on his work as a cin-ematographer who brings a unique sensibility to the craft of fi lming. He has shot fi lms in various languages – Malayalam, Hindi, Tamil, Telugu and English – blending a poetic vi-sion with a keen sense of reality.

G V PRAKASH KUMARComposerThe shrill voice of ‘Chikku bukku chikku bukku rayile...’ is now a suc-cessful music director and fast rising actor. That’s G V Prakash Kumar to you. Emerging from the shadow of his Oscar-winning uncle A R Rah-man, GVP carved niche of his own. His songs are chartbusters and fi lms starring him are blockbusters.

K.U. MOHANANCinematographerHe is one of India’s most accom-plished cinematographers begin-ning his career with outstanding documentaries like ‘Manjuben Truck Driver’ and ‘John and Jane’. He then made a name for himself in the world of advertising fi lms before branching out into the mainstream and inde-pendent Hindi cinema space.

SPULLVideo Streaming Spuul is designed to be a one-stop destination for Indian content and was one of the fi rst companies to en-ter the video streaming business in India. Spuul enables its users stream and download full-length movies in Hindi, Tamil, Malayalam, Telugu, Punjabi and other Indian regional languages.

SIVA-KARTHIKEYANActorSivakarthikeyan’s rise to stardom is one of the fastest in Tamil cinema’s history. From a TV an-chor to a comedian to protagonist of small bud-get fi lms, he is now an A-list actor of Kollywood. His rating and remunera-tion, if sources are to be believed, have surpassed those of even some big-gest stars of the industry.

NIVIN PAULYActor

One of the young faces of Malayalam cinema, Nivin, after the re-lease of ‘Premam’, is described as the next Mohanlal in the social media and got a “super-star” tag too. In 2015, he received the Kerala State Film Award for Best Actor for his per-formance in ‘Bangalore Days’ and ‘1983’.

PRITHVIRAJActor

A blend of looks and talent, Prithviraj is re-ceived the Kerala State Award for Best Actor at the age of 24. He has also acted in a number of Tamil, Telugu and Hindi fi lms. Son of ac-tors Sukumaran and Mallika, Prithviraj made his debut in ‘Nan-danam’ (2002) at the age of 19.


MAKE YOURSELF VISIBLE INPICKLE-MAY 2016 CANNES FILM MARKET ISSUE

INDIA AND BEYOND

Pickle reaches out to audio visual companies in over 50 countries; Targets global buyers and distributors; Film Festivals and markets; Animation production companies; Global companies looking at offshoring from India; Co-production seekers and location service providers. Pickle business guide tracks the entertainment business in India.

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With major fi lm production houses trying to reach out to new audiences, dubbing studios are witnessing phenomenal growth in India. Manish Dutt, MD, VR Films, talks about how he is helping bridge the language gap aided by technology and what future may hold for the industry

SHABNAMDUBBING FACTORY

Manish DuttMD, VR Films Pvt Ltd

Bridging Language

Divide

“India is emerging as a hub to dub for Hollywood and European language fi lms,” says Manish, Managing Director, VR Films. “We are positioning ourselves to be a one-stop shop for all dubbing and sub-titling requirements. Our dubbing factory is making Hollywood in India.”“We have done a number of Chinese fi lms to English, Tamil, Hindi and Telu-gu. Also, when we dub Chinese fi lms into English (neutral English) it is accepted globally,” says Manish.Recently, a major studio asked VR Films to dub their library catalogue in Mara-thi and Bengali besides Hindi, Tamil and Telugu. Soon, you will see Holly-wood dishing out dubbed fi lms in West Bengal and Maharashtra to engage with new audience.The cloud has opened up new business opportunities. “If anyone wants to send

their fi lms for dubbing, then all they need to do is to provide an online link and tell us to localise content. We have the capability to do dubbing in 50 lan-guages. We can deliver the product in 10 days and the end product can be re-trieved from the cloud.”The regionalization of TV channels fur-ther improved bottomlines of dubbing studios. VR Films dubs all Discovery Channels English feed to Hindi, Tamil and Telugu. “We do around 1600 hours of TV dubbing every year.”Interesting local dialects and nuances play a major part in work process and that is the reason for their footprint in state capitals. “We don’t dub Bengali in Mum-bai. We dub it in Kolkata. Similarly, we do Tamil dubbing in Chennai. The authentic-ity, nuances and local idioms will be felt when you dub locally,” notes Manish.

1600HOURS DUBBED FOR TV

EVERY YEAR

500FILMS DUBBED BY

VR FILMS

20LANGUAGES DUBBED AT

VR FILMS

Manish Dutt runs India’s biggest dubbing factory, managing over 900 artistes who lend their voices in several languages to keep his pipeline engaged. Even after clocking 50,000 hours of dubbing and witnessing 80 percent year-on-year growth, Manish’s VR Films is hungry for more.

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He spent four years (1992 to 1996) work-ing with UTV and started his own ven-ture doing fi lms for Channel V. Manish is aided by his brother Krishi Dutt. They belong to a family of cinematographers who worked in Mumbai in sixties and seventies.Set up in 2000, unlike other studios VR Films doesn’t let out their studios for rentals. Its 36 studios are spread across Mumbai, Chennai and Kolkata. They have done over 500 dubbings for Holly-wood fi lms.Twentieth Century Fox’s ‘Beyond En-emy Lines’ was their fi rst Hollywood project. “It was a major challenge and our dubbing was cleared in fi rst take. We did Steven Spielberg’s ‘Minority Report’ and there is no stopping since then,” says Manish, who is well-known in the fi lm market circuit (at Cannes, Berlin and Hong Kong).The closing down of single screen has had a major dent in import of fi lms, espe-cially ‘C’ grade fi lms, which once formed a major chunk of business for VR Films. “The market is getting tougher for small Hollywood fi lms because regional lan-guage fi lms are doing well. There is no space for small Hollywood fi lms in India. The product has to be big to get screened

in theatres today,” says Manish.The entry of players like Netfl ix and Amazon has, however, brought excite-ment to VR Films. “The change is hap-pening right now. The digital is going to explore and throw new work on us,” says a confi dent Manish.In 2000, a chance meeting with CEO of Warner Brothers opened up big biz op-portunities for Manish who dubbed an entire animation catalogue for the com-pany. That was followed up with Cartoon Network and later Pogo.He feels that Indian fi lm producers are satisfi ed and very averse to risk. “The world is talking of $1 billion revenue from a fi lm and we are still talking of Rs 200 or Rs 300 crore. I am waiting for a day when a Shah Rukh Khan fi lm will get released on a Friday in 20,000 cine-ma halls in 40 languages. It can happen. That should be our vision,” says a confi -dent Manish.“We will see a global impact when we re-lease our fi lms in dozen languages out-side India. We are talking 4,000 prints. The world is talking 20,000 prints today. Our mindset has to change,” says Man-ish.Any takers for Manish’s wish?

Date post:	27-Jul-2016
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