Thursday, 13 July 2023, Bengaluru, India
The Walt Disney Company, commonly known as Disney, is ready to explore its options in the Indian market to strengthen its base and make a credible future for its media and streaming business in India.
The US-based media company Disney is reportedly looking at various options to deal with its Star India business, which includes the company opting for a joint venture or applying for a sale.
To strengthen its base and make a credible future for its media and streaming business in India.
While the news may suggest some terrible news, it is not in the least terrible to say. Disney owns the streaming platform Disney+ Hotstar in India, which streams various Disney content in India. This includes everything from anime to live-action movies and TV shows and series. Disney+ Hotstar also has the rights to telecast various sports through the app and website, but only with a valid subscription.
Disney+ Hotstar’s popularity skyrocketed after the streaming platform was given the green light to telecast IPL matches to Indian audiences. The game is very familiar to Indian spectators and is loved by everyone.
Speaking about Disney’s exploration in the Indian territory, The Wall Street Journal reported that the Disney media company is negotiating with at least one bank and discussing about ways to grow the business in India while sharing some of the costs.
However intriguing it may sound, Disney’s story is very limited, and nothing can be made out of what has happened till now. The talks are in the early stages, and it is almost not certain if Disney will carry on this path or seek other adventures.
Disney+ Hotstar was not always Disney+ Hotstar. Once Disney acquired the entertainment rights of 21st Century Fox in 2019 for almost $71 billion, Disney approached Star India. Only after the 21st Century Fox event Star India held hands with Disney, and Hotstar was rebranded as Disney+ Hotstar.
Besides making an entry into the Indian market, Disney didn’t always have plans to come to India. Once Disney captured Fox’s attention, it was a general idea to launch a mission to come to India and extend its services in streaming quality content for Indians.
Star India, one of Fox’s strongest businesses, was an important part of the deal. Star India inducted the idea to build a streaming empire in India for Disney. Who knows what would have happened if Disney hadn’t acquired 21st Century Fox?
Before taking any steps in India, Hotstar was India’s undisputed leader in the streaming category, and not even Netflix came close to competing. Meanwhile, Star India held a strong position in the traditional broadcasting business in India. This was soon not the case as the industry saw emerging businesses disrupting the entire space with their services, which created chaos.
Reliance Jio came into the picture not soon after its release but after Reliance-owned Jio Cinema started to take aggressive bets in the OTT space. With the competition at an all-time high between Disney+ Hotstar and Jio Cinema, things changed for Disney when it lost the IPL’s digital streaming rights to Viacom18 production for the 2023-2027 period. This very well may be the event that led Disney+ Hotstar to come to second place after holding first place for quite a few years.
Losing the digital streaming rights to telecast India’s favorite sports league of all time IPL, hit Disney+ Hotstar’s subscriber count. There have been other disappointments too.
After losing almost 4.6 billion members from its database, Disney+ Hotstar failed to renew its streaming rights to telecast the Formula One racing event. The situation got even worse when Disney+ Hotstar could win the battle to stream exclusive HBO content against Jio Cinema.
While the attractive bit to keep Indian audiences engaged on the platform didn’t stay for long, there have been a few good things going on that may be a massive relief for the US-based streaming platform. The Premier League is still being telecast on the Disney+ Hotstar platform and the inclusion of the Indian Super League may be a total game changer, but it is still a big gamble as to how to bring the fallen numbers back on the platform. With recent changes in Disney Star, changes will allow the company to make better decisions.
Source- inc42
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