Reliance Jio’s JioCinema platform is set to shake up the Indian streaming industry
With an ambitious target to broadcast 100 movies and TV episodes on its JioCinema platform over the next 18-24 months, Reliance Jio, a powerful competitor in the Indian streaming sector, is preparing to confront prominent OTT platforms such as Disney+Hotstar, Netflix, SonyLIV, and Zee5. With a production budget of more than INR 2,000 Cr, these films and series will appeal to a wide range of languages and genres, cementing Reliance Jio’s position as a key player in the Indian streaming industry.
With plans to produce 70 movies and countless vernacular web series in languages such as Hindi, Gujarati, and Marathi, Reliance Jio’s JioCinema platform is poised to have a huge effect on the Indian entertainment sector. According to Jyoti Deshpande, President of Reliance Industries Limited’s media unit, this amount of investment in content generation is unmatched in the Indian entertainment sector. However, it is unclear whether these productions will be offered to viewers for free. This move follows JioCinema’s recent foray into the OTT industry by giving free IPL streaming, directly competing Disney+Hotstar, which had previously relied on IPL for development.
JioCinema’s decision to offer free IPL streaming on its platform was a smashing success, with the app seeing a whopping 5 Cr new downloads over the tournament’s first weekend. During the first weekend, the platform had over 147 million views, adding 10 million new viewers. Notably, as compared to the first weekend of the previous season, the average time spent per viewer for each match increased by 60% to 57 minutes. This follows JioCinema’s prior successful experiment with the FIFA World Cup 2022, which resulted in over 40 billion minutes of viewing time on JioCinema and its sports channel, Sports18.
Despite some technical difficulties, JioCinema’s live broadcast of the FIFA World Cup final garnered a whopping 32 million viewers on the Reliance-backed website. Given its deep finances and huge content collection, JioCinema’s increased push on OTT may offer substantial threats to existing providers like Netflix, Disney+Hotstar, Amazon Prime Video, Zee5, and SonyLIV. JioCinema has the potential to become a strong contender in the content-hungry Indian market, even competing with local and regional platforms like AHA and HoiChoi to extend its vernacular user base, leveraging its alliances and experience in the broadcast arena.
On the same day, Viacom18 finalized its integration with JioCinema, signalling important advances in the OTT industry. This move comes shortly after Apurva Chandra, the I&B Secretary, expressed worry over streaming players’ inadequate self-regulation, which leads to the production of objectionable content. He alluded to the prospect of incorporating the OTT domain into a new National Broadcasting Policy that is currently being developed. Besides, the government raised financial allocations for its media and entertainment arms in Budget 2023, allocating INR 64.75 Cr to the Film and Television Institute of India (FTII) and INR 95.13 Cr to the Satyajit Ray Film and Television Institute (SRFTI).
This development occurs at a time when the OTT market, particularly vernacular material, is booming. According to research, Indians spend 80% of their time on media and entertainment applications, and the business is expected to be worth $70 billion by 2030.
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