JioStar boosts its investments in India media and entertainment, spends reach Rs 30,000 crore in 2025

JioStar continues to make huge investments in media and entertainment sector with spends increasing to Rs 33,000 crore by 2026.

Reliance Jio's Viacom18 and Disney Star formed a joint venture called JioStar last year.

In 2024, the two companies spent Rs 25,000 crore on content alone, said Uday Shnkar, co-founder of Bodhi Tree Systems and vice-chairman of JioStar.

"In 2025, the number went to Rs 30,000 crore and the number next year will be over 32,000-33,000 crore," he said, while speaking at the inaugural edition of the Waves summit.

He added, "In three years we have spent more than 10 billion dollars. When an Indian media company is investing, it is investing entirely targeting the Indian consumer their taste their requirement."

Shankar said that the growth possibilities are enormous for the media and entertainment sector.

Screen entertainment or video entertainment currently is estimated as a USD 30 billion industry in India while the US is close to USD 200 billion and China at USD 75 billion.

The pace of growth will continue but India needs to focus on three big drivers, he said.

"We need to create more content tailored for Indian needs. number one. We have to take distribution even deeper as telecom, the broadband and data revolution is going deeper into the country. Content must keep pace and this can't be one-size-fits-all content and definitely not the global content that's getting peddled here as well as not only the content getting produced in in Mumbai which is catering to the whole country. That model clearly has huge limitations. Then when it comes to the creative infrastructure, we are limited not just not by capital but we are limited hugely by capacity or access to storytellers, writers, producers, directors, actors.

He added, "It will be a factor of how much India focused innovation happens from all the key operators. The growth rate that we've seen over the last three decades if anything that can only get stronger because the distribution, the universe of consumers is much bigger today than it has ever been and there is an opportunity. It's still not saturated you can keep driving deeper," he added.

According to him, India has only seen the first phase of brand building.

"The problem is that we have by and large remained limited ourselves to the same pool of advertisers. There is a need to go deeper and create new brands because the economic activity has become highly decentralized and the valuation is happening in not just tier two cities and towns it's it's gone down to tier three and tier four. We need to find ways to make those economic activities scale up, create bigger brands, expand their market and participate in the value creation. If this happens I don't see why this market cannot double in the next five years," Shankar said.

Limited monetization 

He also highlighted the impact of limited monetization models.

"Most companies have two models of monetization --- advertising and subscription. Advertising has come under pressure. There is no innovation and there is pressure on the existing streams of revenue. In most of the western markets their subscriber or consumer numbers have hit a plateau and there is not enough because of the population. So, I think there is a real opportunity for an indian company to break through all of this and create globally a value that can be indexed globally," he said.

Content regulation

Shankar added that if the media companies have not innovated enough the regulators are even further behind.

"You keep hearing that all screens should be treated alike. No you cannot do that because then you will kill the value in both businesses. Television is a very different business. Digital screens are private screens. The two have a very different purpose and they are in a very different stage of evolution. One is mature and the other is just emerging and you need to leave them free. To homogenize everything will mean that you're homogeneously destroying value from both."

Content and consumption 

Shankar pointed out that about 700 million people are watching streaming content in some form or the other and JioStar has half a billion people coming to the platform.

He added that content has kept pace with consumption.

"In segments it has more than kept pace. In sports, the growth has been heavily driven by the depth and spread of distribution. We didn't stop just at the national languages and major regional languages. Now we have gone deep into dialects like Bhojpuri, Haryanvi and those have expanded the market. Those have brought new audiences. Those have opened new streams of revenue."

However, he said viewers are far ahead of the providers.

"If you want to really take it to the next level and if the content has to keep pace with the aspirations and requirements of this country then you have to start making lots and lots more content locally which is tailored for Indian market.

Bollywood blues

Shankar pointed that Hindi film market has seen a dip.

"Hindi movies have taken a huge hit that is not the case in the southern part of the country. Tamil, Telugu, Malayalam, Kannada, there is a creative resurgence and that creative resurgence is traveling and is translating into huge amounts of economic upsides. But the Hindi film industry or the Bollywood has a huge problem it is still frozen in time in terms of nature of the product that it creates. I think the consumers have moved far ahead and the creative industry in Bollywood is still stuck in time and that is clearly not working. Plus, they have kept the gates closed mostly or when they open, they open narrowly for the flood of new talent."

In India, 65 percent of the population is under 35 years of age and 90 percent of the talent in this in this industry is over 60 years of age and that equation just doesn't stack up, he added.

He added that India has a huge shortage of theaters. "The moving going experience is really expensive. It leaves a hole in your pocket.