With Carvaan, Saregama sings a new tune of success

A library of a few lakh classic songs, dedicated listeners across all age-groups, and a jukebox. Put them all together with the right dose of nostalgia, and Saregama hit upon a winning strategy called ‘Carvaan’, its pre-recorded music box.

Having successfully launched Caravaan, the RP-Sanjiv Goenka Group-owned company is now looking at a portfolio expansion with different variants that include form factors which can be used ‘on-the-go’ (remember the Walkman?).“Portfolio expansion will happen. And, we have our product pipeline ready till 2021,” Vikram Mehra, Managing Director, Saregama India, told BusinessLine .

Also read:Saregama’s Carvaan on a song and going places

Apart from ‘Carvaan’, ‘Carvaan Gold’ and ‘Carvaan Mini’ — three variants and several SKUs across these — the company recently launched the ‘Carvaan Go’. The new product targets users who are on-the-go and it comes with 3,000 in-built songs, an FM radio and also a card drive.

Easy to operate

Saregama introduced Carvaan 18 months back when the country was hit by rampant music piracy and falling music sales. Till then it had found moderate success in music cards and paid online downloads.

Compared with streaming apps or downloads, Carvaan was an easy-to-operate product, especially for the many non-tech savvy music lovers. This ensured the success of the product.

The gambit paid off and nearly 1.3 million Carvaans have been sold till date. It is sold across 22,000 retail touch points (apart from online), with 3,000-4,000 touch points added every quarter.

The devices are being sold in the US, the UK, Canada and the UAE.

Carvaan is now an important revenue stream for the company. Music licensing is still its major income source, though. Mehra, during an analyst concall on January 28, had said Saregama’s music licensing revenues have risen 25 per cent for the April-December FY19 period, over the first nine months of the previous fiscal.

Saregama’s stock exchange filings show it has two major revenue segments. One is ‘music’, which includes Carvaan sales. The other is ‘films/television serials’.

“Both music licensing and Carvaan sales are growing for us,” Mehra says adding that from a B2B company, Saregama has now become a B2C. Majority of the 300-odd employees look into Carvaan sales. This apart, it has also put in place call centres and service centres to address after-sales concerns.

The company is also focussing on new music acquisition across Hindi and Tamil films.

Apart from music licensing and Carvaan sales, Mehra, during the analyst concall, had said: “Yoodlee (Films) now has an output deal going with the Star, so there is a guaranteed revenue profitability matrix we have in front of us.”

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