MxMIndia

Tag: Ashok Kurien

  • Father Subhash Chandra has weathered several storms, and he could well come out of this one too

    Can Punit Goenka survive the coup?

     

    By Our Staff

     

    Primetime, 9pm, is the beginning of the top-rated shows across all general entertainment channels. It’s the same on Star Plus, Sony, Colors as well as Zee TV. But on Monday, September 13, at Zee, there was a fair amount brewing off-air as well.

     

    Two directors – Ashok Kurien and Manish Chokhani – resigned from the Board. Or so the stock exchanges were intimated. Now, Kurien has been founder Subhash Chandra’s friend, and confidante from even before he set up Zee. Journalists like this correspondent took Zee and Chandra (he would suffix Goyal or Goel in his early days) seriously in the early 1990s thanks to Kurien, then one of the posterboys of Indian advertising.

     

    Chandra started out as a rice trader, and anyone who has been exposed to agricultural trading will tell you that one needs to be very sharp to be able to navigate the vagaries of the business. Media may be dramatically different, but in the days when Chandra was entering the scene, there were many situations to contend with.

     

    One was Rupert Murdoch who wasn’t obviously being kind to Zee which had emerged ahead of his Star network. Chandra wasn’t one to let Murdoch have it easy. But come 2000 and Kaun Banega Crorepati happened as did an assortment of saas-bahu sagas, and Zee lost its numero uno status amongst Hindi general entertainment channels.

     

    In the early 2000s, Zee – which was also a darling of the stockmarkets – saw some trouble with government regulators about the ways the company holdings were structured. Chandra steadily got out of the tangles, and started rebuilding the Empire.

     

    In the meantime, he grew the rest of the network. Investments in regional and news channels, distribution, films and overseas fare ensured that the empire had derisked itself from only flagship Zee TV being the cash cow.

     

    In the early 2000s, Chandra’s sons Punit and Amit got active with the various ventures and eventually headed critical components of the media empire.

     

    It was all hunky dory until many incorrect investments led to the company notching up heavy debts. This resulted in the family being pushed to having a minority holding in the all-important Zee Entertainment. Media and distribution were part of other companies. In early August 2021 though, Chandra wrote an open letter stating that he had 91.2 per cent of his debt with 43 lenders. Also, the balance dues will be settled soon.

     

    Cut to last week, when Bengaluru-based proxy advisory firm, Institutional Investor Advisory Services India (IiAS), raised some red flags on corporate governance issues at Zee Entertainment.

     

    This led Zee Entertainment to file a letter it received from its key investors to the stockmarkets.

     

    The letter started with this: We, Invesco Developing Markets Fund (formerly Invesco Oppenheimer Developing Markets Fund) and OFI Global China Fund llC are shareholders of Zee Entertainment Enterprises Limited and hold, as on the date of this letter, 7,43,18,476 equity shares and 9,73,50,000 equity shares, respectively representing an aggregate of 17.88% of the paid-up share capital of the Company that carries the right of voting.

     

    Invesco and OFI asked for the removal of Punit Goenka, Manish Chokhani and Ashok Kurien as directors, and the appointment of six independent directors.

     

    So will Goenka exit as CEO is the question that’s being asked by everyone. The annual general meeting is scheduled for today, September 14, at 4.30pm. The extraordinary general meeting that the investors have asked for in their mail dated, Saturday, September 11, has not been scheduled so far.

     

    There have been views that Invesco and OFI couldn’t have acted in the way they did without a clear study of the situation.

     

    However, according to industry sources, what turn this entire episode takes will depend a fair bit on how some quarters in the government react. The Subhash Chandra family has 3.99 per cent equity, and other than the 17.88 held by the Invesco and OFI, there are investors like LIC and other financial institutions which could follow the central government’s advisory.

     

    Clearly this is a soap opera that’s going to see some twists and turns for sure.

  • Ashok Kurien, the man who ran Ambience Advertising which handled the ad business of Essel Group, recounts how a chance conversation took shape to create one of India's earliest and most successful Hindi channels

    Zee@25 | Ashok Kurien: Zee changed the Indian consumer forever

    Ashok Kurien

    It was a dream that was waiting to become one big reality. When the rest of India was hooked on to the goings-on of the Gulf War in 1991 through relay from international news channels, a bunch of visionaries were contemplating launching a private channel that would do something similar in India. Thus was sown the seed of India’s first and private Hindi channel, Zee.

     

    When we spoke with him in October 2012 on the occasion of Zee’s 20th anniversary, Ashok Kurien, the man who ran Ambience Advertising which handled the ad business of Essel Group, recountedto Johnson Napier how a chance conversation took shape to create one of India’s earliest and most successful Hindi channels. Mr Kurien continues to be on the Board of Directors of Zee Entertainment.

     

    Do you recall how you reacted when Mr Subhash Chandra first came to you with the idea of launching Zee? From what we hear, it’s after your reassurance and active support that he got into it.)

    January 1991: Subhash, my client at Esselworld, and I were watching the Gulf War ‘Live’ on CNN. It was our early exposure to satellite TV in India.

    “Why can’t we do this here in India?” the conversation went.

    “What do you know about TV?” asked Subhash.

    “More than anyone else,” I replied, having spent many years on the ad agency side: Concepts and Pilot programmes, Sponsored programmes and FCT during the Doordarshan days…

    “Write me a business plan,” said Subhash.

    I did… and the rest is history.

    Of course, Subhash was way ahead of me, with advice and plans from some ex-Doordarshan people.

    The first 5 or 6 years, working hands-on to help Subhash build India’s first private TV station, was the most exciting chapter of my life.

    Zee changed the Indian entertainment scenario, and along with it changed the Indian consumer forever.

     

    Zee obviously had the advantage of being the first mover in the Hindi space, and later there were many others who entered the scene. What according to you is the reason Zee has been such a success story?

    Zee moved fast, was always the first, and stayed far ahead of everyone for over the first decade.Zee understood the emotions and tastes of the Indian consumer. It took a long time for the competition to figure it out… mainly by hiring Zee TV’s people.

     

    Other than being a director on the Board, are you active in advising the Zee management presently?

    No advice to Zee at all….. unless I am asked to.I have played a role in helping Dish TV grow to leadership over its first 3 or 4 years, and now helping to take the Zee group into new media with India.com.

     

    If there was one thing that Zee could have possibly have done differently in these 20 years, what would it be?

    Zee should have launched a Tamil/South channel 15 years ago. But it was my error of judgement and ill advice that prevented that. My one, big, unforgettable mistake!

     

    Zee, it’s said, mirrors Mr Subhash Chandra’s personality: dynamic, aggressive, a maverick, often restless, cost-conscious, risk-taker and a visionary. He’s been a friend for many years, would these descriptors be appropriate (for him and Zee). And how much would you attribute the success of Zee to Mr Chandra and in recent years, his family?

    Subhash’s personality is all this and more. He is fearless and will walk where angels fear to treadBut as a friend I have seen the warm, but very private, human side of him too. He has great inner strength, and this too is inbuilt in Zee’s DNA.

    Zee’s success was driven almost 100 percent by Subhash for many years, and only in the last decade or so did the professionals who joined Zee start contributing majorly.

    Punit has reinvented the ‘creative magic’ that Zee started with 20 years ago.

    But today, it’s certainly TEAM ZEE!!

     

    Original Story at:

    http://www.mxmindia.com/2012/10/jaldi-5-with-ashok-kurien-zee-changed-the-indian-consumer-forever/

  • #GiveHer5 is a social movement conceived by Law & Kenneth Saatchi & Saatchi to draw attention to the five days over 350 million girls in India

    Law & Kenneth Saatchi & Saatchi looks to move India to #GiveHer5

    By A Correspondent

     

    #GiveHer5 is a social movement conceived by Law & Kenneth Saatchi & Saatchi to draw attention to the five days over 350 million girls in India (nearly 80 per cent of the country) miss every month, just because of their period. In fact studies show that one in every five girls in India is forced to drop out of school just because she misses five days every month. #GiveHer5 helps give her 5 of ‘those’ days back, so she never misses out on school, her dreams, or her life. All it takes is 150 rupees.

     

    Kickstarted by Ashok Kurien and the Ammada Trust, and powered entirely by women (and men) on Facebook, Twitter and Instagram, #GiveHer5 seeks to crowd source funds to give her Saafkins – the world’s first reusable, 12-hour menstrual protection. A proprietary disinfecting treatment called Livinguard Technology makes each Saafkins antimicrobial, and washable. Now finally, there is an affordable solution for the millions housebound every month during their period.

     

    Within hours thousands had come together to share, like, retweet and pledge their support on social media. And by the end of the day, popular celebrities like Varun Dhawan, Arjun Kapoor and Rahul Khanna had joined the list of people pledging to #GiveHer5.

     

    Commenting on the launch, Ashok Kurien, Founder/Executive Trustee – The Ammada Trust, said: “80 per cent of Indian women cannot afford sanitary napkins – so they use unhygienic cloth. 20 per cent of girls drop out, or miss 5 days of school every month. The Saafkins were invented to put these millions of underprivileged girls back in school and help them complete their education. A unique world-class technology product for just Rs.12 a month. We owe this to our girls!”

     

    Delna Sethna, Chief Creative Officer, Law & Kenneth Saatchi & Saatchi said, “We so have the luxury as urban women to ignore our period… 80 per cent of the female population find their lives coming to a literal standstill for 2-5 of “those” days… We wanted to focus our efforts and impact the lives of the young school going girls, who more often than not drop out of school, rather than deal with the embarrassment (lack of sanitary protection, bathrooms, you name it), of their period… The math, when you put it out there is hard to refute: Rs150… Keeps one girl in school… For one whole year! How can we sit back and do nothing, especially the next time we sit down to order a “tall latte, please?”

     

  • Zee moved fast and was always the first, says Ashok Kurien who backed Subhash Chandra's dream to set up Zee and continues to be on ZEEL's Board of Directors

    Jaldi 5 with Ashok Kurien: Zee changed the Indian consumer forever!

    By Johnson Napier

     

    It was a dream that was waiting to become one big reality. When the rest of India was hooked on to the goings-on of the Gulf War in 1991 through relay from international news channels, a bunch of visionaries were contemplating launching a private channel that would do something similar in India. Thus was sown the seed of India’s first and private Hindi channel, Zee.

     

    Ashok Kurien, the man who ran Ambience Advertising which handled the ad business of Essel Group, recounts how a chance conversation took shape to create one of India’s earliest and most successful Hindi channels. Mr Kurien continues to be on the Board of Directors of Zee Entertainment.

     

    1. Do you recall how you reacted when Mr Subhash Chandra first came to you with the idea of launching Zee? From what we hear, it’s after your reassurance and active support that he got into it.)

    January 1991: Subhash, my client at Esselworld, and I were watching the Gulf War ‘Live’ on CNN. It was our early exposure to satellite TV in India.

     

    “Why can’t we do this here in India?” the conversation went.

     

    “What do you know about TV?” asked Subhash.

     

    “More than anyone else,” I replied, having spent many years on the ad agency side: Concepts and Pilot programmes, Sponsored programmes and FCT during the Doordarshan days…

     

    “Write me a business plan,” said Subhash.

     

    I did… and the rest is history.

     

    Of course, Subhash was way ahead of me, with advice and plans from some ex-Doordarshan people.

     

    The first 5 or 6 years, working hands-on to help Subhash build India’s first private TV station, was the most exciting chapter of my life.

     

    Zee changed the Indian entertainment scenario, and along with it changed the Indian consumer forever.

     

    2. Zee obviously had the advantage of being the first mover in the Hindi space, and later there were many others who entered the scene. What according to you is the reason Zee has been such a success story?

    Zee moved fast, was always the first, and stayed far ahead of everyone for over the first decade.

     

    Zee understood the emotions and tastes of the Indian consumer. It took a long time for the competition to figure it out… mainly by hiring Zee TV’s people.

     

    3. Other than being a director on the Board, are you active in advising the Zee management presently?

    No advice to Zee at all….. unless I am asked to.

     

    I have played a role in helping Dish TV grow to leadership over its first 3 or 4 years, and now helping to take the Zee group into new media with India.com.

     

    4. If there was one thing that Zee could have possibly have done differently in these 20 years, what would it be?

    Zee should have launched a Tamil/South channel 15 years ago. But it was my error of judgement and ill advice that prevented that. My one, big, unforgettable mistake!

     

    5. Zee, it’s said, mirrors Mr Subhash Chandra’s personality: dynamic, aggressive, a maverick, often restless, cost-conscious, risk-taker and a visionary. He’s been a friend for many years, would these descriptors be appropriate (for him and Zee). And how much would you attribute the success of Zee to Mr Chandra and in recent years, his family?

    Subhash’s personality is all this and more. He is fearless and will walk where angels fear to tread!

     

    But as a friend I have seen the warm, but very private, human side of him too. He has great inner strength, and this too is inbuilt in Zee’s DNA.

     

    Zee’s success was driven almost 100 percent by Subhash for many years, and only in the last decade or so did the professionals who joined Zee start contributing majorly.

     

    Punit has reinvented the ‘creative magic’ that Zee started with 20 years ago.

     

    But today, it’s certainly TEAM ZEE!!