Channel V re-tunes to 24-hour music

Star India-owned Channel V has come a full circle. After having transformed itself from being a music channel and to a youth entertainment channel, the company is now going back to its roots as a music-only channel.

As a part of the revamp, Star has already moved out its existing shows and replaced it by 24 hours music content. Channel V used to air shows such as D4, Gumrah, Sadda Haq and Mastaangi among others.

“Our programming will focus on music videos that not only sound good but look good as well. We are presenting the whole thing in a clutter-free environment and with curated content,” Hemal Jhaveri, General Manager and Executive Vice President – Channel V, Star Gold, Movies OK & Utsav movies told Business Line .

Star India is a fully owned subsidiary of 21st Century Fox. Channel V was launched in India in 1996 primarily as a music channel.

Explaining the need to shift to a 24 hour music channel, Jhaveri said the idea was to not compromise on the visual experience. “There are opportunities to grow both in English and Indian music content in an ad free environment”.

Asked if competition from the digital music industry was impacting the business, Jhaveri said that there was space for all players to co-exist.

Industry data say that music consumption pattern is showing a shift with consumers opting for music apps such as Saavn, Gaana and Hungama besides FM channels and Youtube among others.

According to the Deloitte report Digital Media: Rise of On-demand Content, online music users in India are expected to touch 273 million and digital music industry revenues are expected to cross ₹3,100 crore by FY20.

The report said that entertainment services led by audio and video content are at the cusp of inflection point in India.

“A whole ecosystem around such services is coming up. Marketers are also shifting their advertising spends towards digital media and about 36 per cent of their ad spend is expected to go to the digital space,” it said.

“The s-curve growth expectations for the overall digital ad market in India, that include probable cannibalisation of ad revenues from other traditional segments like TV, radio, and print media, indicate a digital ad market size of ₹35,400 crore by 2020,” the report added.

Asked if the company is looking to collaborate with Hotstar, its OTT platform, Jhaveri said, “we are working on it”. He did not give details on the same.

Jhaveri said there was huge opportunity in regional content and also bringing in niche labels. “We are still working on it,” he added.

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