MxMIndia

Category: NEWS

  • Mindshare appoints Ashok Lalla as Leader, Digital, South Asia

    Lalla on board with Mindshare

    By A Correspondent

    Strengthening its senior leadership team, Mindshare, the flagship media agency of GroupM has appointed Ashok Lalla as Leader, Digital for Mindshare, South Asia. Mr Lalla takes over a world class operation that has won Mindshare a large number of awards over the last 3 years, and was also Digital Agency of the Year in 2010. Based out of Mumbai, Mr Lalla will report to Ravi Rao, Leader, Mindshare South Asia.

    Mr Lalla is an award-winning Digital, Brand and Social Media Marketing leader with over 18 years of agency and client business experience on brands that cut across the spectrum from one-cent candies to million dollar hotel stays. He moves from Euro RSCG, where he was President – Digital, and worked with several blue-chip clients including Unilever and IBM. Earlier, he was Director of Internet Marketing at Taj Hotels where he led worldwide Digital strategy and Ecommerce for the hotel chain for 9 years.

    Welcoming Mr Lalla, R Gowthaman, Leader, Mindshare South Asia, said, “Ashok Lalla, joins Mindshare at a time when our digital businesses is well poised to grow manifold, not only on the basic services, but also across Search, Social, Mobile, Creative and Performance Marketing. We are delighted to have him on board to take Mindshare to greater heights in the Digital Marketing space.”

    On his move to Mindshare, Mr Lalla said, “I am excited to join Mindshare, an agency with a mouthwatering array of clients, a great Digital team and a fantastic track record of doing breakthrough digital work. I look forward to taking Digital to the next level for our clients, and growing our team into an even stronger unit that does even more spectacular Digital work, and sets new industry benchmarks.”

    Mr Lalla is a compelling presenter and a visionary keynote speaker on Digital Marketing, Social Media and Brands at leading events and B-schools. He is also the Author  and  curator  of  “The  Future  of  Digital for  Brands”,  a  highly  regarded  online global community of over 1900 Digital, Marketing and Brand experts and enthusiasts from 38 countries.

    Mindshare is a global media and marketing services network with billings in excess of $27.8 billion (source: RECMA). The network consists of 114 offices in 82 countries throughout the North America, Latin America, Europe, Middle East, and Asia Pacific.  Mindshare is a member of WPP, the world’s leading communications service group, and is part of GroupM, the world’s leading full service media investment management operation.

  • Aaren Initiative Outdoor fully acquired by Lintas Media Group, to be renamed Lintas Initiative Outdoor.

    Aaren is now a 100% LMG company

    By A Correspondent

    Lintas Media Group has completed its acquisition of Aaren Initiative, the country’s premier OOH agency that works for Hindustan Unilever and Nokia, among other blue chip accounts. The 50 percent stake held by the joint venture partner, Aaren Advertising, has been recently purchased by Lintas in an amicable settlement. The name of the agency will be changed to Lintas Initiative.

    Aaren Initiative Outdoor was set up as a 50-50 joint venture between Lintas and Aaren ten years ago when the presence of media agencies in the medium was still unknown.  Aaren Initiative was a pioneer in the space, professionalizing media planning, buying and monitoring in this relatively unorganized medium, and grew rapidly into a large agency billing over Rs 150 crores annually, with offices in 28 cities and a network of over 100 employees.

    Lynn de Souza, Chairman and CEO of Lintas Media Group and Chairman of Aaren Initiative will continue to be the Chairman of the wholly owned agency. She said, “Through this acquisition we hope to work with many more global clients and have made plans to invest in the right tools and people to transform Lintas Initiative Outdoor into a future ready OOH and retail player. We are grateful to our erstwhile partners, Aaren, for all their counsel and support during the formative years of the agency”.

    Hemanth Shah will continue to function as the Managing Director. Elaborating on his role, Mr Shah said, “The team shall have the independence to function and nurture non-network clients and the network clients shall experience seamless deliveries. The acquisition allows for the company to plan holistic solutions and integrate them into its offerings right from creative to all-media.”

  • Optimistic about newspaper business, Ravi Dhariwal says challenges can be overcome if industry joins hands and collaborates to find solutions.

    The future is rosy, says Ravi Dhariwal

     

     

     

    By Tuhina Anand

     

    Newspapers have a strong future ahead, says Ravi Dhariwal, President, INMA Worldwide and CEO, The Times of India. Sharing his views with the audience at INMA: 5th South Asia Annual Conference on the Global Newspapers and South Asian Opportunities, he said that the industry can unitedly face down the challenges confronting it, and continue on the growth path.

     

    Print players in developed markets when faced with pressure on profitability coupled with losing their revenues started focusing on the cost. The result was a cut in journalists, cut pages, and cut quality. They got seduced with the argument that the business was not well balanced, circulation not earning enough money and being too dependent on advertising to recover the cover price. On the other hand, the consumers have tons of option, multiple platforms while the truth of newspaper also exists that the brand has slimmed down from 48 pages to 24 and journalism was not of the same quality that they were used to. Consumers had to pay double the amount for a newspaper so the value equation particularly in the US got horribly wrong. This led to increased pressure of people but Dhariwal pointed that the situation is stabilizing now particularly on accounts of circulation, balance sheets and profitability pressure.

     

    He said, “I think the industry went through a phase of evaluation where they were came to a basic conclusion that digital is where the growth is and they must invest heavily there at the expense of print. That difference led them to doing things first for the digital and at the expense of print because they didn’t have monies to put both sides. They said all growth will be in digital so let’s invest there.”

     

    After making this point, Mr Dhariwal said that this assumption has a few problems, the first being that Digital at best in most advanced environment comprises only 10 per cent of the revenue, the rest being still from print. He said, “So if you put all your money in 10 percent and neglect the 90 percent there is a problem.” He also said that digital for a news media company is an inherent problem because very little of a person’s time on digital gets spent on news. As a result digital for a news company will always be the country cousin. Also the demographics in South Asia, with increasing urbanization, literacy, income and a young curious democracy, works as a great combination for newspapers to grow. He said, “The industry does grow in our country by 4-5 percent per annum. Readership doesn’t grow as fast, though it is not declining, but it doesn’t get reflected because of the way readership is measured in India currently.”

     

    Another reason why he remains bullish about the growth of newspapers is because the newspaper adds fantastic value to households. He said, “It’s a medium that allows an individual to spend 20 minutes of their quality time for less than Rs 3 and if you have a thrifty wife like mine you will get a rupee back at the end of the month by selling it in raddi. So for Rs 2 you get a newspaper at great pricing but what is even better is that it gets home delivered.”  Another reason for growth is because the editorial quality has improved. He said, “I think our editors are increasingly aware of what is happening to our readers and the newspaper reflects the interest of the readers – politics, local, community. Increasingly quality of newspaper is getting better and I am confident that the paper I read is getting better every day. Also in our country people in newspaper business are ambitious, they are not happy with just influencing people but want to see their business grow. They have brought multiple editions and geographic expansion; like it’s astounding that Dainik Jagran has 295 editions. Even at TOI, we have many editions but there lies tremendous opportunity in markets like Kerala, some big city in TN, AP. In expansion we not only give our readers great value but also great choice.”

     

    What one should worry about, he said, is how to manage cost and how to continuously innovate to give more to advertisers. He said, “As long as we invest behind innovation, quality of editorial product, keep price low, and the product is home delivered, then we don’t have to worry. We have a reason to celebrate.  The opportunity is that we have an editorially curated product which is now being able to be displayed and expressed in different platforms. We should go after that because the reader is going after that. I have always maintained that for us it’s not digital first or print first. It is not print dollars and digital dimes but Its Print and Digital.” Even media companies have realized this and have become multimedia companies, adapting to this change.

    The biggest of the challenges, he said, is that of managing cost, newspapers not being attractive to FMCGs who are the biggest advertisers and have turned to TV, environment where the government tries to create misunderstanding and rift among employees and lastly lurking fear of ‘what if’ digital expands dramatically and affects print. However, to a large extent he said that these challenges can be overcome by collaborating as an industry to find solutions and bring about a change.

     

     

     

     

     

  • INMA aims to reach a wider audience, says the outgoing president, adding that falling readership and rising ad costs are a two-pronged challenge the industry has to tackle.

    INMA 2011: Membership targets in sight, says Tariq Ansari

    By Tuhina Anand

    At the concluding ceremony of INMA’s 5th South Asia Annual Conference, MXM India caught up with Tariq Ansari, INMA South Asia’s outgoing President and Managing Director, Mid-Day Multimedia Ltd. From Mr Ansari, Sanjay Gupta, Director, CEO and Editor, Jagran Prakashan Ltd takes over as President INMA South Asia.

    Mr Ansari has played a key role in bringing INMA to South Asia and has held the position of President for the last two years. Talking about his task at INMA, he said, “I have been responsible for running the INMA platform in South Asia, making conferences happen and ensuring we build a significant membership.  On all these, I think we have progressed significantly.  The idea is to be of use to the industry and give back to the industry. As past president I remain on the board and I am available when required.”

    Explaining why the INMA membership remained confined to just 13 organisations even though there are many players in this category, he said, “INMA had the target of going after large newspapers first. While we have only 13 newspaper organization members, there are around 500 people in this country who have access to INMA through these companies. As we come of age – and we haven’t been here for long as this is the 5th conference in South Asia – there will be conscious effort to build our membership and deliver its benefits to a larger audience.”

    Mr Ansari said he hopes that INMA delegates after attending the seminars would take away some questions on what is going to be the future of their enterprise and directions it can take both in terms of strengthening the business and where future opportunities might lie.

    Talking about what ails the print industry, he said, “Speaking from the perspective of an urban English newspaper, I think the readership is getting stagnant but on the other side the cost of inputs – the cost of journalism, newsprint, running the business – is driving the rate of advertising very high. So we have got a situation where readership is not growing but advertising rates are going up. That is the fundamental problem to the business to my mind.”

  • Uday Shankar re-elected IBF president

    By A Correspondent

    Star India CEO Mr Uday Shankar was re-elected president of the Indian Broadcasting Foundation at its annual general meeting in New Delhi yesterday.

    Until recently treasurer, Mr Sunil Lulla, CEO and MD of Times Television Network will be vice-president. Zee Entertainment Enterprises Ltd CEO Punit Goenka will be the new treasurer.

     

    Detailed report on MxMIndia tomorrow

  • Fortune India’s first ranking of India’s 50 Most Powerful Women in Business includes Balaji Telefilms’ Ekta Kapoor and HT Media’s Shobhana Bhartia.

    Fortune India releases ranking of 50 Most Powerful Women in Business

    By Akash Raha

    For the first time Fortune India ranked India’s 50 Most Powerful Women in Business in its November issue. Shobhana Bhartia, Chairperson and Editorial Director, HT Media Ltd. is one of the media personalities to make it to the top ten at number seven spot.

    Chanda Kochhar of ICICI Bank is in the first place, whereas Shikha Sharma of Axis Bank and Mallika Srinivasan of TAFE have taken the second and third place in the ranking.

    Kirthiga Reddy, India Head, Facebook; Lynn De Souza, Chairman and CEO, Lintas Media Group and Radhika Roy, Managing Director and Executive Co-Chairperson, NDTV Group are at number 21st, 39th and 45th spot respectively.

    Dibyendra Nath Mukerjea, Editor, Fortune India said, “Indian women span generations and today we find them in every field. Acquisitions, garnering profits, successful new ventures, pioneering concepts, snagging mega deals…all important factors, no doubt, when defining power. We looked at the changes they brought in, and the way they transformed businesses. In the process, we made some surprising discoveries. But then, surprise was what we expected when we put together Fortune India’s first ranking of the most powerful women in India Inc.”

    Other women who figure amongst the Top 10 as per the 50 Most Powerful Women in Business by Fortune India, include – Aruna Jayanthi, CEO, Capgemini India; Zia Mody, Co-founder, AZB Partners; Vinita Bali, Managing Director, Britannia Industries; Shobhana Bhartia, Chairperson and Editorial Director, HT Media; Chitra Ramakrishna, Joint Managing Director, NSE; Kiran Mazumdar-Shaw, Chairman & Managing Director, Biocon and Frenny Bawa, ex-MD, RIM India.

     

    Pavan Varshnei, President of Fortune India, said, “Fortune India’s Most Powerful Women in Business list is the most comprehensive ranking of influential women in Indian business.”

     

    The issue also carries a feature on the compensation package of the 10 highest paid Indian business women. The story gives a graphical comparison of the salaries of the highest paid women in India vis-à-vis their counterparts in US and the highest paid men in India.

     

    Fortune India’s 50 Most Powerful Women in Business

     

    Chanda Kochhar, MD and CEO, ICICI Bank

    Shikha Sharma, MD and CEO, Axis Bank

    Mallika Srinivasan, Chairperson, TAFE

    Aruna Jayanthi, CEO, Capgemini India

    Zia Mody, Co-founder, AZB Partners

    Vinita Bali, Managing Director, Britannia Industries

    Shobhana Bhartia, Chairperson and Editorial Director, HT Media

    Chitra Ramakrishna, Joint Managing Director, National Stock Exchange

    Kiran Mazumdar-Shaw, Chairman and Managing Director, Biocon

    Frenny Bawa, ex-Managing Director, RIM India

    Meenakshi Saraogi, Joint MD, Balrampur Chini Mills

    Naina Lal Kidwai, Group General Manager and Country Head, HSBC India

    Preetha Reddy, Managing Director, Apollo Hospital Enterprises

    Amrita Patel, Chairman, National Dairy Development Board

    Harshbeena Sahney Zaveri, MD and President, NRB Bearings

    Kalpana Morparia, CEO, J.P. Morgan India

    Mira Kulkarni, MD, Mountain Valley Springs India

    Sujata Keshavan, Co-founder, Ray+Keshavan Brand Union

    Roopa Kudva, Managing Director and CEO, CRISIL

    Renuka Ramnath, Founder, Managing Director and CEO, Multiples Alternate Asset Management

    Kirthiga Reddy, India Head, Facebook

    Priya Paul, President, Park Hotels Group

    Jasmeet Kaur Srivastava & Gitanjali Ghate, Managing Directors, The Third Eye

    as above –

    Rama Bijapurkar, Marketing Consultant

    Kaku Nakhate, President & Country Head India, Bank of America Merrill Lynch

    Rekha Menon, Executive Director, Accenture

    Neelam Dhawan, Managing Director, Hewlett-Packard India

    Sangeeta Pendurkar, Managing Director, Kellogg India

    Vedika Bhandarkar, Vice Chairperson, Credit Suisse

    Ekta Kapoor, Joint Managing Director, Balaji Telefilms

    Vishakha Mulye, Managing Director & CEO, ICICI Venture

    Reshma Shetty, Managing Director, Matrix India Entertainment Consultants

    Sminu Jindal, Managing Director, Jindal SAW

    Renu Sud Karnad, Managing Director, HDFC

    Ritu Kumar, Ritu Kumar Design

    Anuradha J. Desai, Non-executive chairperson, Venky’s, and chairperson, V. H. Group of companies

    Vandana Luthra, Founder and mentor, VLCC Health Care

    Lynn De Souza, Chairman and CEO, Lintas Media Group

    Bala Deshpande, Country Head and senior MD, New Enterprise Associates India

    Suvalaxmi Chakraborty, CEO, State Bank of Mauritius (India)

    Farah Khan, Co-founder, Three’s Company

    Meher Pudumjee, Chairperson, Thermax

    Ashu Suyash, Managing Director and Country Head, India, Fidelity International

    Radhika Roy, Managing Director and Executive Co-Chairperson, NDTV Group

    Rajshree Pathy, Chairman and Managing Director, Rajshree Sugars and Chemicals

    Swati Piramal, Director, Piramal Healthcare; Vice Chairperson, Piramal Life Sciences

    Manisha Girotra, Chairperson and Managing Director, UBS

    Meera Sanyal, Country Executive & Chairperson, RBS India

    Anita Arjundas, Managing Director, Mahindra Lifespaces

  • Rajesh Jejurikar joins Zee as prez

    By A Correspondent
    Zee Entertainment Enterprises Limited (Zee) has announced the appointment of Mr Rajesh Jejurikar as President, Zee Entertainment Enterprises Limited (ZEE). Mr Jejurikar has resigned has Chief Executive-Automotive Division at Mahindra & Mahindra. He will report to Mr. Punit Goenka, MD & CEO, ZEE for his role. In a career spanning 24 years, Mr Jejurikar, has worked in the packaged goods industry and advertising before he joined Mahindra & Mahindra in 2000.

    Speaking on the appointment, ZEE MD & CEO, Punit Goenka said, “We welcome Rajesh to the Zee family and are confident that his joining will further add to our capability of being a fiercely competitive Organisation. His vast experience in marketing and brand building will add immense value to the Organisation.”

    Commenting on his new role, Rajesh Jejurikar, the newly appointed President at Zee said, “After having spent a fulfilling decade at Mahindra, where I have grown and learned so much, both personally and professionally, I am happy to now be a part of India’s pioneering television broadcasting company. The dynamics of the media and entertainment sector excites me and I look forward to working with the Zee team.”

    Mr Jejurikar is a 1986 batch MBA from S. P. Jain Institute of Management and is likely to join Zee in February 2012.

     

  • With only a month after launch, the channel has grabbed the No 2 position in the Factual Entertainment space

    It’s a fact! Factual ent grows with History

    By Rishi Vora

     

    Factual Entertainment as a genre in India has been a niche segment for many years, dominated primarily by Discovery and National Geographic. The recent entry of History from the JV of TV 18 and US based A + E Networks, however, promises a lot of action. With only a month since its launch, the channel has already made an impact.

    According to TAM Media Research, it is now placed at No 2 in the line-up of factual entertainment channels with a market share of 28 per cent in the metros; and it garners the highest time spent per viewer in the genre (35 minutes against Discovery’s 23 and National Geographic’s 16 minutes). And by all means, the channel has expanded the genre by 30 per cent, all India, reaching out to 45 million viewers, in the CS 4+ market.

     

    What’s the success mantra?
    There is no denying that the Network 18 clout and the reputation of the US major A + E Networks, helped in the successful launch of the channel. But, as the company officials state, the success story has a lot to do with good programming, distribution and marketing.

     

    The channel embarked on a 360-degree campaign with Salman Khan, urging viewers to switch to a different kind of programming within the factual entertainment arena. Sangeetha Aiyer, General Manager – Marketing, shared her thoughts on the campaign. “All the research we’d done showed that there is a huge market in India for the type of content we had and that there is a lot of inherent weariness for existing content. This is the reason for our positioning as watching something fresh and new. Also, all our efforts during the launch campaign were primarily to broad-base the genre, whether it is the 360-degree marketing thrust, the 5 language feeds, huge distribution thrust, or using Salman as brand ambassador.”

     

    On why Salman as the brand ambassador, she explained, “Salman has a phenomenal appeal across demographics, psychographics, regions; he is inherently ‘cool’ and brings with him an element of unexpectedness. A combination which is impossible to resist. There was never anyone else we even considered. Also he’s not just our brand ambassador; we’ve also cleverly integrated him in our programming and packaging and have more plans with him in the pipeline.

    Cell 18, a division of Network 18 has worked extensively on the look and feel of the channel, the on-air promotions and packaging.   Zubin Driver, Group Creative Director, Network 18 and CEO, Cell 18 added to Aiyers point on having Khan on the channel as the brand ambassador. “The idea to go with Salman Khan was completely out-of-the-box, primarily because one doesn’t expect Salman to be the brand ambassador of a factual entertainment channel. And what he does on History and what the viewers are accustomed to see him as, is very different.  So that’s very clutter breaking and interesting.”

    Driver further added that the challenge was to match up to the international standards of A + E channels, as far as the packaging and the creative look and feel of the channel was concerned. Elaborating on the kind of work that has happened on the channel, Driver said, “There is a great amount of detailing which has gone into the campaign. Show specific designs, using mnemonics and graphics and to integrate that with Salman, was a huge challenge. And I’m glad at the end of it we’ve done a pretty good job.”

    Sudheer KG, VP and Programming Head shared the early apprehensions that the team share prior to launch. “We were very cautious right from the beginning, because History as the name suggest—immediately what first comes to mind is the boring sort of a channel with an old look and style, with no fun element in it. So our immediate task was to see how we could make one, the genre more interesting and second, to make our channel more entertaining. The idea of dubbed content helped us maintain the Indian flavour in every show.”

     

    The programming strategy the channel has adopted is pretty simple. To look at the huge library of shows that History channel in the US has, and pick up shows from there that could suit the Indian viewers. And of course, the customisation which follows to make shows more relevant and meaningful for Indian audiences. In the times to come, the channel will look at different formats and if need be, acquire international content as well.

     

    Passage Through India with Caroline Quentin, currently on air, is one of the popular shows, where the host travels all over India and introduce many aspects of Indian culture. Another show that is likely to be launched in the near future is Freddy Versus the World, featuring Cricketer Andrew Flintoff in trying some of the most extreme sports and challenges on offer.

     

    As it seems from here, the challenge is to keep the momentum going. And that could be achieved by doing innovative yet relevant content. Being a niche segment, factual entertainment as an industry was observed to be stagnant for a while. Now that History has announced its arrival, there will be a lot to watch out for in this small yet growing industry.

  • does it for Sony; channel records a new high.

    Sony touches new ratings high with Rs 5 crore KBC episode

    By Rishi Vora

     

    Every Indian does seem to harbour the dream of becoming a millionaire. Last week’s ratings of Top 10 television shows reveal that Kaun Banega Crorepati (KBC) has, in its fifth season, registered a new high, becoming the highest TRP grosser among all weekday shows after Colors’ Uttaran did in 2009.

     

    The episode aired on November 1 registered 7.2 TVR while the episode on November 2 touched 8.03 TVR. The KBC episodes on these days were much-publicised and aired the winning of Rs 5 crore by a resident of Bihar. The channel has also upped its GRPs to 287 from last week’s 236, with KBC being the No 1 show in the week with an average TVR of 6.4. However, industry watchers feel Sony will see a dip in GRPs post KBC.

     

     

    Sneha Rajani, Senior EVP and Business Head, Sony Entertainment Television said, “The success of Sushil Kumar in KBC is an emphatic endorsement of the fact that KBC is not just a game show, but a melting pot of knowledge and aspirations of the aam aadmi, and the numbers show that KBC this season has broken all barriers of demography and geography and transformed lives of people all across the country.”

     

    In absolute numbers, the show has managed to reach out to 25 million people on November 1, and 27 million people on November 2, with 18 percent reach and 43 minutes of average time spent.

     

    Other channels too gained in week 45. Star Plus jumped to 335 GRPs from last week’s 273. Colors rose to 240 from 236 the previous week, while Zee TV rose from 131 to 143.

  • There was much optimism at the Casbaa 2011 convention with rapid changes on the technological front for television

    Technology changes offer hope for broadcasters at Casbaa

    By Nibha

    The 2011 edition of the Casbaa Convention closed last week with high optimism at a time of rapidly altering business models and quick time technological change for TV services across the Asia Pacific.

     

    “The new models provide huge opportunity,” said Mr Simon Twiston Davies, CEO, Casbaa, “while more than 420 million non-terrestrial TV connections are being logged across the region. Meanwhile, there are already more homes with multichannel TV inAsiathan the rest of the world combined.”

     

    On hand to give expert opinions during a variety of insightful panel sessions staged during CASBAA 2011 were a roster of high-powered international executives including Jana Bennett, President, Worldwide Networks & Global iPlayer, BBC Worldwide; Andy Lack, CEO, Bloomberg Media Group; Olivier Barberot, Chairman & CEO, GlobeCast Worldwide; Shuichi Mori, President & CEO, Jupiter Telecommunications; Blair Westlake, Corporate VP, Media & Entertainment Group, Microsoft; Jeff Shell, President, NBCUniversal International; Shigeki Nishiyama, Representative Director, Chairman, SKY Perfect JSAT Corporation; and, Nobuya Wazaki, President, WOWOW.

     

    Mr Tetsuo Yamakawa, Japan’s Vice Minister at the Ministry of Internal Affairs – and some of the most influential international players in Japan – detailed opportunities for deepening pay TV penetration in a market hungry for global content and collaboration with international partners and investors.

     

    India, too, continues to be an important market in the region and the hugely complicated and expensive task of digitizing the Indian market was the subject of one of the Convention panels. Mr Ravi Mansukhani, MD of IMCL, said digitisation would lead to a huge amount of localization of content and value-added services being introduced into the market. It was clear that setting a deadline for the switching off of analogue services was just the beginning of the process.

     

    Mr Liang Xiao Tao, President, CITVC described how TV audiences are evolving in China, shifting to online viewing and social media, and how more open policies on broadcasting are likely to see a shift away from the dominance of the big players.

     

    According to a lively team of panelists discussing the future ofMalaysia’s multichannel market there’s plenty of room for new entrants to the market. “Nearly 50% of the population have never had pay TV and they’re the ones who aren’t having their needs met,” pointed out Ms Kathleen Syron, Chief Content Officer, YTL Communications.

     

    With technology evolving so fast, this is an exciting time to be in the broadcasting business. The role of social media in the TV viewing experience came under the spotlight where the multiplier effect of channel and programme fans recommending TV content to their friends was immense.

     

    As well, as consumers increasingly demand content everywhere and anytime, the industry is combining technologies to get the best solutions for all the devices people are now using to watch video. An example was given by Mr John Couling, VP Marketing, Products and Platforms, Dolby, who mentioned that the next frontier will be bringing top-quality sound to mobile and tablet devices, so that there’s greater continuity of content quality across platforms.

     

    While opportunities abound, the challenge is in revising pay TV business models that would be just as valid in a world of multiple devices as it is to when the industry was literally just a box in the living room.

     

    As the era of digital delivery continues to grow, however, the threat of online piracy looms large and there is an imperative need to effectively address this problem.

    Held in conjunction with the Convention, Casbaa’s Annual General Meeting of its 130 Member companies drawn from 17 Asian markets saw the re-election of Mr Marcel Fenez of PwC as Chairman of the Association and the election of Mr Mark Patterson, CEO, Asia Pacific, GroupM to its Board of Directors. As part of a global media investment management group, Mr Patterson will bring a strategic commitment to advertising to the Association board.

     

    Stepping down from the Board of Directors, Mr Tom Keaveny of Discovery Networks Asia Pacific was recognized with Casbaa’s prestigious Chairman’s Award for his contributions to the development of Pay-TV in the region and his tireless work explaining the overall value of Pay TV to advertisers.

     

    Finally, in recognition of the importance of being able to give back to the communities that we operate in, Casbaa raised nearly US$50,000 during the annual Charity Ball presented by Turner for Plan International’s Early Childhood Care and Development Project to benefit underprivileged children in the Philippines.

  • Press Council of India chairperson Justice Markandey Katju outbursts havve triggered a volley of criticism

    More bite for toothless PCI?

     

    By Akash Raha

    Recently Chairperson of Press Council of India (PCI), Justice Markandey Katju triggered a volley of criticism and discussion after he lambasted the broadcast media, saying most of them suffer from “very poor intellectual level”. He went on to suggest that broadcast media should come under the purview of the PCI. MxM India asked some well-known media faces what they think.

    Arnab Goswami, Editor in Chief, Times Now and Vice President, Broadcast Editors’ Association (BEA) told MxMIndia: “I don’t know why Justice Katju is making these comments. There is absolutely no need to try and demolish the principle of self-regulation in TV news which ensures that electronic media is free and out of control of vested interests. Justice Katju should not make these sweeping generalizations.”

    Upset over Justice Katju’s comments on the media, former Chief Justice of India J S Verma too is reported to have recently called the PCI an “ineffective” body and said it should wrap up if it does not meet its mandate. Verma chairs the News Broadcasting Standard Authority (NBSA), which is set up by the News Broadcasters Association (NBA). In a recent statement Verma said that he is “deeply anguished” with the kind of language that Justice Katju uses which “sounds authoritarian”. NBA has requested the Prime Minister to stop the PCI from meddling with the dealings of broadcast media.

    On whether broadcast media should come under the ambit of the PCI, Rajdeep Sardesai, Editor in Chief, IBN18 Network said “I believe that the self-regulation mechanism which has been put in place by major news broadcasters must be allowed to strengthen itself. The Press Council has been unable to curb pernicious practices in the print media such as ‘paid news’, so I don’t see how mandating it to now to oversee the electronic media will serve any purpose.”

    Talking about whether he thinks electronic media should be brought under the purview of  PCI Paranjoy Guha Thakurta, an independent journalist and critic, said, “The electronic media needs to be regulated independently – this is because self-regulation is inadequate and ineffective under certain extreme circumstances. The regulator should be independent of both media interests – including the interests of the big corporate media – as well as the government. Even if the regulator is funded by the government, it can be truly autonomous and/or independent if it is Constitutionally mandated thus – such examples include the Supreme Court of India, the Election Commission of India and the Comptroller & Auditor General of India. Ideally the electronic media should have a separate regulator. Even if the ambit of the Press Council of India is widened to include the electronic medium, it has to be made truly independent and autonomous and, most importantly, empowered. The Press Council in its current form has no punitive powers and is hence akin to a toothless tiger.”

    To put things in perspective, PCI was established as a statutory print watchdog by an Act of Parliament in 1978. In recent times, PCI has come under question following chairperson Justice Markandey Katju’s recent remarks on the state of the media in India and its inability to keep a check on paid news.

    When asked if Justice Katju was trying to police the media, Mr Guha Thakurta played down the suggestion, saying, “The Press Council of India is a quasi-judicial body set up an act of Parliament. The way it is supposed to function has been clearly laid down. There is no question of Justice Katju (or for that matter, any Chairman of the Press Council) acting as either a good cop or a bad cop.”

    The question remains, should news broadcast come under the ambit of PCI? One of the reasons for opposing such a suggestion remains that since PCI has been unable to check the menace of paid news in print, there is no reason why it should make any positive change in the broadcast industry. Another argument says that the only reason why PCI has been unable to make a change is because it is still a toothless quasi-judiciary body and the government needs to empower it and give it some tooth. Either way, in this chatter and amidst much confusion is set Justice Katju and his criticism of media professionals as he sees them as naïve and stupid. Criticism which has obviously riled the veterans of the broadcast industry.

    In the wake of this controversy, several discussion forums are being organized on the PCI, the question of paid news, etc. The Foundation for Media Professionals (FMP) is organizing a panel discussion in collaboration with the Press Club of India on the topic ‘Media and Public Interest: Freedom vs Accountability’ on November 12 at Press Club of India, New Delhi. The panelists at this discussion will be Markandey Katju, Rajdeep Sardesai, Neelabh Mishra, Zoya Hasan, Pankaj Pachauri, Abheek Barman, Madabhushi Sridhar and Paranjoy Guha Thakurta with T R Ramachandran as moderator.

    Later, on November 18, MxMIndia has partnered the event ‘Paid News: Fooling People all the Time’ organised by Moneylife Foundation and Citizens Action Network with the support of industrialist Cyrus Guzder to be held in Mumbai’s Madame Cama Hall. The evening will see the screening of the documentary ‘Brokering News’ followed by a panel discussion with senior journalists and the film-maker Umesh Aggarwal. The panelists at this discussion are Umesh Aggarwal, Ayaz Memon, Paranjoy Guha Thakurta, Bhawana Somaaya, and Sucheta Dalal. This panel plans to discuss the issue of paid news, which has been a bugbear even for regulatory bodies such as the PCI.

    For more: http://www.mxmindia.com/2011/11/mxmindia-partners-%E2%80%98paid-news%E2%80%99-event/

  • Haresh Chawla quits as Group CEO of Network18, to oversee seamless leadership transition at media conglomerate; to pursue other Interests

    Haresh Chawla quits Network18 to pursue ‘other’ interests

    By A Correspondent

    Mr Haresh Chawla, who has led Network18 for well over a decade, is currently overseeing a seamless leadership succession plan at the half-a-billion-dollar (in current year’s revenues) media conglomerate spanning news and entertainment broadcasting, web portals, publications, filmed entertainment and ecommerce operations and Viacom18.

    Commenting on Mr Chawla’s decision to eventually pursue other interests, Mr Raghav Bahl, Founder & Editor of Network18, said: “Haresh is the kind a of colleague one can only dream about, so utterly honest, committed and focussed he is on delivering excellence. However, I fully understand his desire to explore other interests, being a person with such boundless enthusiasm and passion for success. Perhaps Haresh’s greatest achievement is the strong cadre of next-generation leadership that he has nurtured at several of our Group operations. Over the next few months, Haresh will work closely with me and this young crop of leaders to ensure a seamless transition of leadership. Finally, on a personal note, I wish to say that you never can quite say good-bye to an extra-ordinary friend and colleague like Haresh. He will always be around, as a friend, philosopher, guide and advisor to Network18, and me, personally. His can-do spirit is irretrievably woven into Network18’s DNA.”

    Adding to the sentiment, Mr Chawla said: “It’s very rare for a professional to play a part in setting up so many businesses in a lifetime, and to lead such a talented team as we have at Network18. I am forever grateful to Raghav for the opportunity and the faith that he had in me. And I am deeply grateful to all my colleagues who worked with me to build this Network. Together, we built an enviable culture of excellence and speed at Network18, and I will work towards ensuring this legacy is carried on with the new leaders in the Group. Personally, it’s been a most fulfilling phase of my life and I now look forward to taking on newer challenges”