‘India will soon witness the advent of post-paid DTH services’ :evil:
]Despite being a late entrant in direct-to-home services, already dominated by national players like Tata Sky and Dish TV and local players like Sun Direct in South India and DD Direct in North India, Reliance Anil Dhirubhai Ambani Group-owned Big TV DTH swept away five lakh connections in the first 50 days of launch. The current run rate is 10,000 connections per day. At the helm of this huge effort is Arun K Kapoor, president, BIG TV DTH, who shares his thoughts with FE’s Pritha Mitra Dasgupta. Excerpts:
What kind of research did you do before launching Big TV in India? What according to you was lacking in the DTH sector?
The inception of Big TV DTH was to address the needs of a burgeoning market for a wholesome family entertainment service for the 125-million odd TV household markets in the country. Like innumerable pro-consumer services, Big TV DTH is the world’s latest and fully digital platform to address the 125-minute-odd TV household market in India, by offering over 200 channels including 32 exclusive movie channels. The scale and magnitude at the launch stage of Big TV DTH has never ever been tried before by any DTH operator across the world.
How is the international DTH market vis-à-vis India? What are the international innovations or ideas that are likely to touch India soon? Is there anything in particular that Big TV is aiming to bring to India?
Big TV DTH is India’s first and only fully digital home entertainment service addressing 125 million Indian households across 6,500 towns in the country. The scale and magnitude of home entertainment services offered by Big TV DTH has never been tried nor has ever been as successful as Big TV DTH across the world. The wholesome family entertainment offered by Big TV DTH makes it the fastest growing DTH service.
Why is the Indian DTH market based solely on pre-paid model?
Indian DTH market will soon witness the advent of post-paid DTH services. The large and established consumer-oriented players like Reliance ADA group would soon bring many innovative and customer-friendly features like postpaid services on their DTH platforms, which are difficult for existing players to replicate.
With the competition getting intense, DTH players are talking about differentiation. Everyone seems to be gung-ho about customer service and superior technology. How do you plan to differentiate Big TV?
Even at its launch stage, Big TV DTH is offering double the value or volume. as compared to existing, established players. The mantra to success is to offer superior quality, better content appealing across customer segments at comparable price points being offered by supposed competitors.
You have announced to launch DVR-enabled set-top-boxes. Is it true that you may package this with a LCD television set?
The 125-minute-odd Indian TV household market is soon going to witness initiatives like online recording-enabled set-top boxes, with pro-consumer players like BIG TV entering the home entertainment service market offering wholesome family entertainment service market.
Recently competition has launched a similar technology; however, they have kept it at a premium price. What will be the cost of Big TV DVR connection?
There are players vying to offer Big TV look-alike services. The value proposition being offered by Big TV is not easily replicable, considering the fact that by the time others inch closer to Big TV, we would double its content-offering.
Going forward, do you think consolidations are inevitable?
Reliance ADA Group’s intrinsic philosophy revolves around organic as well as inorganic growth to enhance value for its 12 million shareholders. Big TV DTH is fully geared up to take strategic advantage of any consolidation that may happen in the DTH sector.
Recently, you said that revenue in top cities will be driven by VAS and DVR and ARPU is also high in these areas. How?
DTH sector in India is poised to traverse a similar path as the telecom sector. The capabilities and synergies driven by VAS and enriched hardware can be better utilised by DTH players like BIG TV DTH, backed by the expertise of Reliance ADA group which serves over 100 million customers.
You have talked about cross-bundling. Are you offering special packages to existing Reliance customers?
Cross-bundling of relevant customer propositions to enhance customer experience is a viable option being considered by Big TV DTH driven by its pedigree of Reliance ADA group, which serves over 100-minute customers across diverse industries spanning telecom, IT, utilities, power, financial services, entertainment and infrastructure amongst others
]Despite being a late entrant in direct-to-home services, already dominated by national players like Tata Sky and Dish TV and local players like Sun Direct in South India and DD Direct in North India, Reliance Anil Dhirubhai Ambani Group-owned Big TV DTH swept away five lakh connections in the first 50 days of launch. The current run rate is 10,000 connections per day. At the helm of this huge effort is Arun K Kapoor, president, BIG TV DTH, who shares his thoughts with FE’s Pritha Mitra Dasgupta. Excerpts:
What kind of research did you do before launching Big TV in India? What according to you was lacking in the DTH sector?
The inception of Big TV DTH was to address the needs of a burgeoning market for a wholesome family entertainment service for the 125-million odd TV household markets in the country. Like innumerable pro-consumer services, Big TV DTH is the world’s latest and fully digital platform to address the 125-minute-odd TV household market in India, by offering over 200 channels including 32 exclusive movie channels. The scale and magnitude at the launch stage of Big TV DTH has never ever been tried before by any DTH operator across the world.
How is the international DTH market vis-à-vis India? What are the international innovations or ideas that are likely to touch India soon? Is there anything in particular that Big TV is aiming to bring to India?
Big TV DTH is India’s first and only fully digital home entertainment service addressing 125 million Indian households across 6,500 towns in the country. The scale and magnitude of home entertainment services offered by Big TV DTH has never been tried nor has ever been as successful as Big TV DTH across the world. The wholesome family entertainment offered by Big TV DTH makes it the fastest growing DTH service.
Why is the Indian DTH market based solely on pre-paid model?
Indian DTH market will soon witness the advent of post-paid DTH services. The large and established consumer-oriented players like Reliance ADA group would soon bring many innovative and customer-friendly features like postpaid services on their DTH platforms, which are difficult for existing players to replicate.
With the competition getting intense, DTH players are talking about differentiation. Everyone seems to be gung-ho about customer service and superior technology. How do you plan to differentiate Big TV?
Even at its launch stage, Big TV DTH is offering double the value or volume. as compared to existing, established players. The mantra to success is to offer superior quality, better content appealing across customer segments at comparable price points being offered by supposed competitors.
You have announced to launch DVR-enabled set-top-boxes. Is it true that you may package this with a LCD television set?
The 125-minute-odd Indian TV household market is soon going to witness initiatives like online recording-enabled set-top boxes, with pro-consumer players like BIG TV entering the home entertainment service market offering wholesome family entertainment service market.
Recently competition has launched a similar technology; however, they have kept it at a premium price. What will be the cost of Big TV DVR connection?
There are players vying to offer Big TV look-alike services. The value proposition being offered by Big TV is not easily replicable, considering the fact that by the time others inch closer to Big TV, we would double its content-offering.
Going forward, do you think consolidations are inevitable?
Reliance ADA Group’s intrinsic philosophy revolves around organic as well as inorganic growth to enhance value for its 12 million shareholders. Big TV DTH is fully geared up to take strategic advantage of any consolidation that may happen in the DTH sector.
Recently, you said that revenue in top cities will be driven by VAS and DVR and ARPU is also high in these areas. How?
DTH sector in India is poised to traverse a similar path as the telecom sector. The capabilities and synergies driven by VAS and enriched hardware can be better utilised by DTH players like BIG TV DTH, backed by the expertise of Reliance ADA group which serves over 100 million customers.
You have talked about cross-bundling. Are you offering special packages to existing Reliance customers?
Cross-bundling of relevant customer propositions to enhance customer experience is a viable option being considered by Big TV DTH driven by its pedigree of Reliance ADA group, which serves over 100-minute customers across diverse industries spanning telecom, IT, utilities, power, financial services, entertainment and infrastructure amongst others
