Gurjeev Singh Kapoor, Head – Distribution and International, Disney Star, speaks of the growth of TATA IPL23 on Television per BARC data from the first 29 matches, and the initiatives that have helped it grow
The previous edition of the IPL reached around 78 percent of unique viewers in the total television-viewing universe. What’s the reach of Tata IPL23 on Linear for the Tata IPL23?
Gurjeev Singh Kapoor: I’m happy to share that even before the beginning of this IPL, Star Sports already used to consistently reach closer to eight out of 10 Pay TV homes, and now, Star Sports channels are in nine out of 10 Pay TV homes; that’s an addition of 11 million Pay TV homes. So that’s been a big one.
As the largest TV network today, that’s in sync with our mission at Disney Star to take sports to every individual, every consumer, every home in the country. And I think with that in play, we set out the agenda for reaching out to more number of homes, especially for this IPL.
So all these things put together gave us solid strong subscribers and reach growth. And the BARC data for the first 29 matches shows we have 409 million viewers for this IPL so far, which is 37 million higher than the entire reach of IPL in 2022. Not only that, the first match registered 30 percent higher viewership than the previous IPL, and the 29 matches played out this year registered 24% higher than the first 29 matches in the previous IPL. So all in all, I think a big win for IPL, a big win for us in terms of more subscribers, more numbers and more engagement with our viewers.
How did you achieve this reach-growth of 11 million to Pay TV homes? And how did you market IPL on TV to the distribution fraternity?
Gurjeev Singh Kapoor: It was a result of the combined efforts of our distribution team, which has always had a great professional relationship and partnerships with all our affiliates. We have been in India for close to 30 years now, and that has contributed to our relationships with, and understanding of, our partners. Plus, we understand this landscape, and how this landscape has evolved.
We have partnered very deeply with our affiliates to take the Sports channels and our content to all the consumers at large. And for the first time, we’ve seen this partnership really thriving in a manner we’re very proud of.
It’s a tough, complex job reaching out to every single distribution partner – close to 900? – in India. What’s your mix of process and personal service to them like?
Gurjeev Singh Kapoor: Yes, more than 850 affiliates spread across the country. And to give you a brief perspective, we have an account-based structure here to service all these 850-plus affiliates. We work closely with numerous Local Cable Operators (LCOs) and DTH retail points to understand their needs and provide solutions that benefit end-consumers and enhance their experience.
All these accounts are handled by managers and account heads who understand the operators, their markets, needs, their customer profiles, and more.
We not only provide them with the quality and value of the Star Sports channels, we also engage with these partners in a meaningful manner at every step of the way. It is an ever-ongoing engagement and interaction to help them serve their customers in the best possible way, and that helps us to up the amplification of the reach and the subscription.
We went into the market with a joint marketing initiative and programs to upsell, cross-sell, look at ways and means to take the Star Sports channels to bring more and more viewers and subscribers into play. We joined forces with our affiliates to launch joint marketing plans, aimed at attracting incremental subscribers from various consumer segments.
So one driver that helped you propel the subscription- and reach objectives was the big play that came in from the distributors and affiliates. What else helped you increase your total Pay TV homes numbers?
Gurjeev Singh Kapoor: I would say four more things helped us – our packaging & pricing, the regionalization agenda, and the kind of amazing content presentation and innovations in our studios. Along with this we had partnered with Airtel Digital and Tata Play to launch interactive services like Instant Highlights, Stats Feed and Key Moments which enhanced viewer engagement. The wonderful content put in by Star Sports team gave the distribution team a very strong and powerful offering to take to cricket lovers across the country with the help of all our distribution partners.
Regionalisation of sports content really helped us penetrate deep into various markets. We already had five dedicated channels for Star Sports — Hindi, English, Tamil, Telugu and Kannada. And for the Tata IPL23, we added four more language feeds to take the total to nine languages. We added Malayalam, Bangla, Marathi and Gujarati feeds, and we’ve seen a huge consumer traction coming in.
Which markets therefore grew the most?
Gurjeev Singh Kapoor: Other than HSM, we saw excellent growth especially in markets like West Bengal,Gujarat, AP, Telangana, Orissa and Maharashtra, which really paid off for us, and a lot of new homes have come in this year for us from there.
And the other distribution-reach growth drivers?
Gurjeev Singh Kapoor: Another lever has been the kind of packaging and pricing we have curated for our viewers at large. With NTO 3 coming in, the objective was to come out with a new packaging and pricing, and we designed ours in a manner that’s been appreciated by all our subscribers at large.
Our packages are affordable. We have sports as part of our value pack offering, which has multiple other channels like GECs, movies, infotainment and kids channels, and this bouquet is for the entire family. This is a wholesome entertainment for the entire family.
So if a viewer doesn’t want to take a bouquet, they generally go in for an a la carte channel, and we haven’t changed our a la carte rates, which remain the same, at Rs 19, for standard definition and high definition.
And we’ve seen that this has been really appreciated by the subscribers; the adoption of packages and a la carte channels has been quite phenomenal,and the numbers are in the top bracket.
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How did Star Sports perform in the HD TV homes?
Gurjeev Singh Kapoor: Total HD homes in India are 75 Mn as per BARC. The ratings are out for the first 29 matches, and as per BARC, we have seen a 66 million reach of HD sports channels for the first time in a linear broadcast, and this is almost three times the previous edition of IPL for the first 29 matches. So that’s been a big revelation.
We have seen the numbers doing the talking, especially in this year, we launched two HD sports channels – Star Sports 1 Tamil HD and Star Sports 1 Telugu HD. These language markets are very big markets for us down south. And on the first cut, we have seen good growth, especially in the AP/TL market, as far as HD subscription is concerned.
Earlier, we had two HD languages – Hindi and English — for Star Sports, and now with these two HD Channels added, we’re at a total of 7 HD channels for Star Sports (these are Star Sports 1 HD, Star Sports 2 HD, Star Sports 1 HD Hindi, Star Sports Select 1 HD, Star Sports Select 2 HD, Star Sports 1 Tamil HD and Star Sports 1 Telugu HD).
And as we have seen now, with 7 HD channels for Star Sports, there is more, deeper engagement when it comes to HD sports content viewing.
And Disney Star has always had a decent percentage of its TV channel offerings in HD..
Gurjeev Singh Kapoor: That’s because as you are aware, people love watching HD content, especially when it comes to sports; I think it’s an engaging, enriching experience, and especially from the consumer lens, with a wider picture that is five times sharper, and with 5.1 Dolby Surround Sound.
And the HD homes has been growing in India, we have 75 million HD homes in the country. This is reported by BARC India, and every two years this number of homes has doubled. And I think from the Disney Star perspective, we have been the vanguard of the HD business for a very long time; not just now, and the offering we have today is about total 77 channels which we operateof which we have 40 percent of those channel offerings in HD; so we have 31 HD channels.
So our belief in HD has been there for a very long time, we’ve been entertaining the audience, giving them the best of HD experience. And like I said, we started the HD revolution in India a long time back. And when people didn’t have any experience with HD channels, we had three HD channels in the country. And today, we have seven HD channel only for Star Sports, and it is all part of our ongoing mission to provide greater delight to all stakeholders in the value chain.
Close to three decades of working closely with the large distribution community. Describe the synergies that drive your relationships and have helped you increase the reach numbers. Despite the fact that the DPOs and Broadcasters have most often been at loggerheads in the past…
Gurjeev Singh Kapoor: See, I believe that both, great content, and excellent pipelines of its delivery right till the last mile and the viewers’ homes, are equally important. And both, us, that is the broadcasters, and the DPOs, have always been in the business of taking best-quality content to our viewers at large. We are here to delight the viewer, and for both, us, the consumer remains at the centre of any distribution strategy we want to implement.
So when broadcasters engage with DPOs in a meaningful manner, there is a mutual, shared vision. We have always worked very closely with our (Distribution) partners, and that’s why we’ve had a fabulous year so far on the back of our agenda of taking sports deep and of amplifying the numbers, in which we have succeeded because of our partnership with the affiliates. We engage with our partners, and it is a mix of our relationships, the appeal and value of watching the IPL on television which are a strong combination and this works in the interests of the consumers.
So everything has played out very well so far. Including the fact that especially after COVID, I think people have loved coming back to the stadiums to watch these games. And especially for our business, which is watching on television, worked well for us.
BARC data for the first 29 matches shows we have 409 million viewers for this IPL so far, which is 37 million higher than the entire reach of IPL in 2022. Not only that, the first match registered 30 percent higher viewership than the previous IPL, and the 29 matches played out this year registered 24% higher than the first 29 matches in the previous IPL. So all in all, I think a big win for IPL, a big win for us in terms of more subscribers, more numbers and more engagement with our viewers.
NXT Digital as a pipeline of content delivery for linear is truly amazing, because it can reduce the cost of a COPE to between 9 to 16 lakh and make help make every LCO completely self-dependent. How has the relationship been with NXT Digital? How are you deploying the combined synergies of your objectives to reach the back of beyond geographies, and HITS’ ability to get you there?
Gurjeev Singh Kapoor: From a business perspective, we are completely platform-agnostic, and look at any and every platform that will help us deliver more and get to more number of homes – whether it’s DTH, cable or the HITS service from NXT Digital which like you said, enables the LCO without having to invest highly in a digital network or setup and comes really handy especially for smaller markets, smaller villages and towns that are not connected via cable through wiring because that becomes very expensive.
So I think that’s a good start, we have seen some numbers moving up, especially in smaller markets. But like I said, we are more than happy to serve any and every customer — whether it’s through cable, DTH or through HITS. And even this year, we partnered deeply with NXT Digital as well as the Hinduja Group to push that objective and initiative.
Digital is growing well, and JioCinema has been making strong investments in the quality and innovations and languages for its presentation of the IPL. We believe it is a TV and Digital game – always has, and for a long time, will continue to remain so. What is your view?
Gurjeev Singh Kapoor: I don’t think that’s a zero-sum game at all. I’ve always firmly believed that both can co-exist and have always co-existed. I don’t know why people say TV or Digital; it should be TV and Digital. You should look at expanding the market, you should grow the pie. And I think at Disney Star, we have been upping the game for both, our linear and digital pipelines, and since we are speaking about linear right now in the context of the TATA IPL23 on Star Sports, when it comes to linear, we have upped that game yet again.
We are the best in class, whether it’s the number of homes reached or the subscribers we reach out to. We remain the Number One on linear in terms of our network market share, which is closer to a 30 per cent.
Television is here to stay because it is the largest aggregator of audiences. We have seen that the sports viewership has grown by 11 percent in 2022. As per BARC, 758 million people who watched Sports on linear TV in 2022
So all these things are great factors for me.
The most recent survey, that just came in, done by YouGov, tells us that 83% of the audience preferred watching sports on television. So I’m sure if somebody wants to watch on television, you are there giving them a service. But if somebody doesn’t want to watch on television, then there is another platform, which is digital, which can provide that service. But here we are in the business of delighting and engaging with the consumers. And we should continue doing that.
And as for the television business, it is really powerful in India because it reaches 900 million individuals from 210 million homes across Pay and FTA channels, and there is great headroom for growth because there are close to 100 million homes that don’t have TV at all. So it’s a very fertile ecosystem where there is an opportunity of growth.
And I’m sure for digital as well, whether it’s through mobile with more than 550 million smartphones and the number is growing. So I’m sure there is an opportunity for both the mediums to grow. And I think one must look at expanding the market, being more magnanimous, not myopic in the way we look at business.
…because eventually, it is about jointly, collectively, delivering the maximum value to the most important stakeholder, the viewer, and through them to the advertisers and brands and for the distribution fraternity. How has out-of-home viewing contributed to the reach of IPL this year compared to last year?
We are yet to measure that, but if you go to any pub, restaurant, airport, hotel, whether in the lobby or wherever, you have a big screen which is probably showcasing the IPL – whether it’s the live game or the games which have been played the day prior. So I think Star Sports is everywhere, wherever you go now.
While I don’t have a number to substantiate that right now, what this does is it brings in the importance of the appeal of the IPL for families, communities, friends who want to watch a game together, without a delay in the live action. So that experience is phenomenal.
TV for IPL in particular and Sports in general, is a platform where families come together to enjoy high live sporting action. It establishes common narratives and drives brand conversations, and Cricket on television reaches not only to the core Male TG but also to all family members.
What kind of growth amongst kids did IPL on Star Sports witness?
We witnessed staggering growth among kids (2 to 14 years) across all editions of the IPL. That is a big fillip for brands targeting that consumer cohort. 9.32 crore kids tuned in to watch the live broadcast of the first 29 games this year, at an increase of 58.7% over the last edition. And kids, you know, are the ones who wield the maximum pester power in buy decisions in homes in India.
Of the around 11 million TV homes added to your total Pay TV homes reach for Star Sports, can you break the contributions from the different spaces?
It’s really been a multi-pronged effort and push which continues. We’re happy with the way the reach of Star Sports has grown to reach 90 percent of the total Pay TV households.