4K Service channel renamed as Star Sports 4K by Airtel Digital TV

[Ashok Varma]

If they offer most of Broadcasters events on 4K Service channel without Ads still it's worth for Rs. 50 or 100, whereas OTTs already turning like heavy ads Lite version of Satellite TV.

Live sports without ads not feasible due to heavy acquisition cost, even for Amazon Prime Video (NZC cricket)

 

[dino29]

If they offer most of Broadcasters events on 4K Service channel without Ads still it's worth for Rs. 50 or 100, whereas OTTs already turning like heavy ads Lite version of Satellite TV.

Yes anna bcoz investments r too high and ad revenue is needed for financially viable business model even on OTT....there r handful of people willing to pay for high priced premium subscription for ad free content and same is not enough for a company/platform to earn desired revenue. Freemium model is way forward to cater to larger audience base and all OTT platforms have realized this

 

[RdX]

Live sports without ads not feasible due to heavy acquisition cost, even for Amazon Prime Video (NZC cricket)

Yes anna bcoz investments r too high and ad revenue is needed for financially viable business model even on OTT....there r handful of people willing to pay for high priced premium subscription for ad free content and same is not enough for a company/platform to earn desired revenue. Freemium model is way forward to cater to larger audience base and all OTT platforms have realized this

Yeah, heavy acquisition cost reason for ads, this IPL itself explains audiences to big way difference between OTT/TV. Somewhat OTT get success from Freemium and overall it's negative impact those OTTs claims Premium/Ad free experience simply.

 

[RdX]

Freemium model is way forward to cater to larger audience base and all OTT platforms have realized this

Freemium model is good, but most of time can't skip targeted different ads we will miss after wicket/over bowlers next deliveries from these things.

revenue is needed for financially viable business model even on OTT....there r handful of people willing to pay for high priced premium subscription for ad free content and same is not enough for a company/platform to earn desired revenue.

I'm sure there are lot of audience ready to pay for IPL and Sports events without Ads interrupt. hope it's gain huge viewership and positive vibe on OTT market, if they rollout premium plan or bundled Premium plan itself everywhere on their own Retail companies to online book my show.

 

[The Lonelier Island]

Freemium model is good, but most of time can't skip targeted different ads we will miss after wicket/over bowlers next deliveries from these things.

That problem is not specific to OTT. It happens on TV. One thing I will give you is that it's stupid to have ads on the launch of content specially on likes of Hotstar and JioCinema. When we stream atleast first few minute needs to be ad-free. Imagine you are switching from TV to OTT because of signal interruption or a power cut in the middle of a crucial over than you get bombarded with ads. Hotstar here is the bigger guilty player. They show ads of their own shows which is just stupid.

I'm sure there are lot of audience ready to pay for IPL and Sports events without Ads interrupt. hope it's gain huge viewership and positive vibe on OTT market, if they rollout premium plan or bundled Premium plan itself everywhere on their own Retail companies to online book my show.

Sony Liv was totally adfree before. I recall watching India's matches from their South Africa tour back in 2018 completely ad-free. But watching cricket like that is totally boring. It sucks the fun out of the match. Gap between few overs are fine. It's not gonna work. You already got ad within the match itself in the name of strategic timeouts.

Also giving ad-free option is a big no. Piracy will increase as people will go for ad-free option anyday. Market here is also not mature. People who pay for internet feels they are entitled to free content as they are already paying for internet. Trying to charge them a premium that would be above ₹1000 for any sports is not feasible for anyone. Just look at how people are complaining about F1. People will pay for expensive merch. Travel to watch F1. But will still complain about paying a premium price to stream.

 

[dino29]

Freemium model is good, but most of time can't skip targeted different ads we will miss after wicket/over bowlers next deliveries from these things.

I'm sure there are lot of audience ready to pay for IPL and Sports events without Ads interrupt. hope it's gain huge viewership and positive vibe on OTT market, if they rollout premium plan or bundled Premium plan itself everywhere on their own Retail companies to online book my show.

Well anna to be honest we know why for certain key events like IPL or BCCI cricket broadcasters or OTT platforms r wanting to use every free second available to stream ads and earn revenue bcoz they have invested a huge amount in buying rights...also other sporting properties for which they acquire rights too come at very high price but generate not that much revenue hence to accommodate all these things they look out for ways to maximise revenue be it thru ads or via providing sports channels or OTT subscription in bundled packages.

Coming to ur 2nd point, OTT itself has a very small subscriber base compared compared to Pay TV universe and within this small base there would hardly 1% willing to buy premium ad free subscription costing a lot ....still the larger public who r coming onto OTT platforms look for affordable way to watch content and are fine with ads. OTT platforms have hence developed / are developing various business models to enlarge their subscribe base & maximise revenue....there freemium model where certain mass content is made available for free & revenue is earned thru ads then there r somewhat affordable mobile and other plans which provide choice to people to opt for a plan which suits their budget and these have ads playing while content is streaming thus adding a balance between revenue earned thru subscription + ads. All these business models will co-exist so as to expand the OTT growth.

Remember not just sporting properties but in general rights of other content or cost involved in making original shows and even operational costs associated with running an OTT platform with host of services + features is extremely high thus lower priced subscription plans cannot help the platform recover huge investments and earn profit. Even if we r saying say Rs. 100 or 150 per month for regular OTT plans or Rs. 50 or 60/month for mobile only plans of a broadcaster then we r getting content spanning so many genres....If u combine the price of channels of that broadcaster u pay for month on DTH / Cable Platform to what we pay to same broadcaster via its OTT platforms then OTT still costs very less and is quite affordable for the large variety of content we get to watch on it....u can even have a broader comparison by combining monthly channel costs we pay for all key channels of leading broadcasters vs what we pay for their OTT Platforms and still OTT is very affordable. Just like TV Channels despite having much larger viewer base require ad revenue to remain financially viable then OTT with a lot smaller audience base also does require ad revenue to cater to general audience via affordable OTT subscription plans...even if hypothetically around 20 or 30 years from now OTT subscriber base reaches to current TV universe level still ads would remain to be part of their revenue model.

Coming to initial ad free experience claims made by OTT platforms those r similar to what HD channels used to say when they were launched as in intial phase companies try to attract maximum people and initially brands do not buy ad slots on channels particularly for premium category ones hence in this window such strategies r worked out by companies / broadcasters to build buzz about the channels / OTT platforms...later Ad Free option remains but such plans cost very high as is the case now on OT while for TV same is not possible

 

[Ashok Varma]

Well anna to be honest we know why for certain key events like IPL or BCCI cricket broadcasters or OTT platforms r wanting to use every free second available to stream ads and earn revenue bcoz they have invested a huge amount in buying rights...also other sporting properties for which they acquire rights too come at very high price but generate not that much revenue hence to accommodate all these things they look out for ways to maximise revenue be it thru ads or via providing sports channels or OTT subscription in bundled packages.

Coming to ur 2nd point, OTT itself has a very small subscriber base compared compared to Pay TV universe and within this small base there would hardly 1% willing to buy premium ad free subscription costing a lot ....still the larger public who r coming onto OTT platforms look for affordable way to watch content and are fine with ads. OTT platforms have hence developed / are developing various business models to enlarge their subscribe base & maximise revenue....there freemium model where certain mass content is made available for free & revenue is earned thru ads then there r somewhat affordable mobile and other plans which provide choice to people to opt for a plan which suits their budget and these have ads playing while content is streaming thus adding a balance between revenue earned thru subscription + ads. All these business models will co-exist so as to expand the OTT growth.

Remember not just sporting properties but in general rights of other content or cost involved in making original shows and even operational costs associated with running an OTT platform with host of services + features is extremely high thus lower priced subscription plans cannot help the platform recover huge investments and earn profit. Even if we r saying say Rs. 100 or 150 per month for regular OTT plans or Rs. 50 or 60/month for mobile only plans of a broadcaster then we r getting content spanning so many genres....If u combine the price of channels of that broadcaster u pay for month on DTH / Cable Platform to what we pay to same broadcaster via its OTT platforms then OTT still costs very less and is quite affordable for the large variety of content we get to watch on it....u can even have a broader comparison by combining monthly channel costs we pay for all key channels of leading broadcasters vs what we pay for their OTT Platforms and still OTT is very affordable. Just like TV Channels despite having much larger viewer base require ad revenue to remain financially viable then OTT with a lot smaller audience base also does require ad revenue to cater to general audience via affordable OTT subscription plans...even if hypothetically around 20 or 30 years from now OTT subscriber base reaches to current TV universe level still ads would remain to be part of their revenue model.

Coming to initial ad free experience claims made by OTT platforms those r similar to what HD channels used to say when they were launched as in intial phase companies try to attract maximum people and initially brands do not buy ad slots on channels particularly for premium category ones hence in this window such strategies r worked out by companies / broadcasters to build buzz about the channels / OTT platforms...later Ad Free option remains but such plans cost very high as is the case now on OT while for TV same is not possible

D+Hotstar have 6.1 crore subs watching ad free movies and shows, which are 20% comparing to pay tv subs, not 1%.

 

[karan_hdl]

As I could see discussion running regarding revenue streams of OTT and TV broadcast, I recently wondered how jio cinema offering free streaming of IPL would profit them but while thinking deeply I understood that Jio would make huge profits via data subscription from subscribers...

In the same way we need to deeply analyze in general whether is there any revenue sharing happening regularly between network providers and OTT platforms, and likewise we also need to further think whether there are also any other indirect revenue streams for OTT Platforms?

 

[dino29]

D+Hotstar have 6.1 crore subs watching ad free movies and shows, which are 20% comparing to pay tv subs, not 1%.

What r u stating bro? Disney+Hotstar has total subscriber base of 5.5 crore or so and out of this around 1 or 2% would have opted for the highest ad free plan. Entire OTT platforms subscriber base is around 100 million (excluding YouTube). Largely out of these many r consuming free content , rest r paid subscribers which have opted for ad supported OTT plans and minute 1 or 2% would have opted for high cost ad free plans. So in effective even if there r say 50 million paid subscribers on OTT platform the Pay TV universe is almost more than 3 times its size.

You can refer to articles on Google for more data/information about this. Also please read carefully what i said i did not say paid subscribers of OTT platforms r 1 % if compared to total subscribers which r part of Pay TV universe....i said out of total number of people who have opted for Paid OTT subscription plans mere 1 or 2% would be opting for highest ad free plans

 

[RdX]

That problem is not specific to OTT. It happens on TV. One thing I will give you is that it's stupid to have ads on the launch of content specially on likes of Hotstar and JioCinema. When we stream atleast first few minute needs to be ad-free. Imagine you are switching from TV to OTT because of signal interruption or a power cut in the middle of a crucial over than you get bombarded with ads. Hotstar here is the bigger guilty player. They show ads of their own shows which is just stupid.

Sony Liv was totally adfree before. I recall watching India's matches from their South Africa tour back in 2018 completely ad-free. But watching cricket like that is totally boring. It sucks the fun out of the match. Gap between few overs are fine. It's not gonna work. You already got ad within the match itself in the name of strategic timeouts.

Also giving ad-free option is a big no. Piracy will increase as people will go for ad-free option anyday. Market here is also not mature. People who pay for internet feels they are entitled to free content as they are already paying for internet. Trying to charge them a premium that would be above ₹1000 for any sports is not feasible for anyone. Just look at how people are complaining about F1. People will pay for expensive merch. Travel to watch F1. But will still complain about paying a premium price to stream.

Only difference is On TV Broadcaster suddenly cancel Ads once bowler start bowling, But in OTT can't skip these user targeted different ads.

Even I experienced this earlier on OTT, I thought Jio Cinema slightly different from hotstar. But they're same like hotstar/other OTTs, except HD/4k PQ and advanced features.