Will regional rule the roost in India’s streaming space in 2022?

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Over the top (OTT) platform Voot kicked off 2022 by launching its first Kannada web series titled Humble Politiciann Nograj.

The platform said it is focusing on reaching out to newer audiences and markets across India. “Humble Politiciann Nograj is the first in a robust list of regional originals that will drop over 2022. Over the next 12 months, we will significantly dial up our regional language roster,” said Ferzad Palia, head, SVOD and international business at Viacom18, which owns the video-on-demand platform.

Like Voot, other streaming platforms are stepping up their regional content play.

Regional ramp-up

Gautam Talwar, chief content officer, MX Player, said they are focused on diversifying their content offerings with the number of regional shows doubling for 2022.

He said the platform has been focusing on offering digital-first regional shows headlined by some of the biggest names in these language markets.

“For example, we did (Marathi web serial) Samantar 2 with Swwapnil Joshi and Sai Tamhankar last year, (Tamil show) Queen with Ramya Krishnan the year before, among others,” he said.

Zee Entertainment’s digital arm ZEE5 too has its focus on expanding its regional content offerings in 2022.

“Local content is the guiding force of the OTT content umbrella. On ZEE5, almost 50 percent viewership comes from regional language content. We currently house regional original content in Telugu, Tamil, Kannada, Bengali and Punjabi. We foresee the next wave of growth coming from Tier 2 and 3 cities looking for diversity in original content,” said Manish Kalra, chief business officer, ZEE5 India.

The platform, which offers content in 12 languages, has plans to increase investments in regional content from 15 percent to 30-40 percent, according to a Confederation of Indian Industry (CII) and Boston Consulting Group (BCG) report.

The report added that players like Disney+Hotstar see over 40 percent share for regional in total content consumption.

“The shift to OTT from broadcast has made both the barriers to entry and the barriers to access significantly lower, which is driving the current boom in regional OTT,” said Utkarsh Sinha, managing director of Bexley Advisors, a media advisory firm.

Share of regional

It is estimated that the share of regional language consumption on OTT platforms will cross 50 percent of total time spent by 2025, said a 2021 FICCI-EY media and entertainment report titled Playing by New Rules.

According to analyst Karan Taurani, senior vice-president, Elara Capital, out of the original shows produced, the share of regional content has increased to 50-60 percent in recent times compared to 20 percent three to four years ago.

Industry estimates suggest that the share of regional OTTs in India’s streaming space is close to 40-45 percent in terms of consumption and this is due to their original content ramping up.

The CII-BCG report pointed out that in the two last years, regional OTTs had 45-50 percent share in acquiring direct-to-digital releases whereas pan-India streaming players had 50-55 percent share.

Rising regional OTTs

Along with national players, niche OTTs also have plans to increase their content this year. The rise of regional language streaming platforms was one of the key trends in 2020 and saw the entry of language OTTs like Telugu OTT Aha, Malayalam OTT Koode and Marathi OTT Planet Marathi, among others.

One of the top players in the streaming space with over 1.5 crore subscribers, Bengali OTT Hoichoi has plans to take its total number of original shows to 100 by the end of 2022 by launching about 32 originals this year.

Aha will continue with one release every Friday and will offer more originals, web shows and non-fiction shows. It is also preparing for a Tamil launch during Pongal this year.

As for Planet Marathi, it will launch about 18 shows and six movies this year.

Tapping new markets

Looking to strengthen their regional content strategy, players in the streaming space are focusing on newer markets.

“We forayed into the Punjab market in September last year, and we want to expand our presence in the southern markets. The focus with respect to languages shall be on Punjabi, Tamil, Telugu, Kannada and Bengali,” said Kalra.

MX Player’s Talwar said they will be increasing investments in regional content, adding, “We are looking at venturing into Bengali shows in 2022.”

He added that while the platform sees strong user base traction from the Hindi-speaking markets, they aim to build engagement in markets like South India, West India and the eastern cities. “In 2022, Maharashtra, West Bengal and Tamil Nadu will be key growth states for us,” he said.