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GLOBAL REPORT
1/22/07
Site focuses on Indians overseas
Mumbai's Rajshri Media, which boasts 700 pieces of
entertainment content online, targets wealthy expatriates.
MUMBAI, INDIA — A Bollywood studio has launched
a video-on-demand website for Hindi films and other programs in the first
attempt by the Indian film industry to use the Internet to tap the wealthy
Indian diaspora.
Mumbai-based Rajshri Media, a division of one of the biggest filmmakers and distributors in Bollywood, as the Hindi-language film industry is often called, has shown its latest film, "Vivah," on its new portal, Rajshri.com, at the same time it was released in Indian theaters to try to woo nonresident Indians to its service. "Movies, cricket and probably religion are the three things that bind Indians everywhere," said Rajjat A. Barjatya, managing director of Rajshri Media. The website represents the first time that a company from Bollywood has tried to take advantage of the extensive broadband access enjoyed by many overseas Indians to sell them films. "Anyone who gets the first-mover advantage to reach out to the larger audience of NRIs [nonresident Indians] would certainly have an edge," said Rajesh Jain, a national industry director with KPMG in India. An estimated 20 million Indians and people of Indian origin live in foreign countries, and many of them are in the upper income brackets. In the U.S., the richest such market, there are about 200,000 Indian millionaires, and about 15% of Silicon Valley start-ups are believed to be owned by Indians, a report by JPMorgan said. JPMorgan said exports of Indian films were growing at about 60% a year but still constituted only a small proportion of the industry's sales, estimated at $1.5 billion last year. "In the coming years, revenue from overseas markets, particularly Indians living overseas, will become more important for Bollywood filmmakers," JPMorgan said in the report. Web portals could become a part of this, but Barjatya said the company was still experimenting with formats. "Vivah," a film about the importance of commitment in an arranged marriage, costs $9.99 to download, compared with $2 to $4 for an Indian theater ticket. The website features 100 or so older films that can be watched free in streaming format. About half of them can be downloaded for $4.99 each. In total, the site has about 700 pieces of content, including music videos and TV series. Most of these have subtitles in English or other languages. Rajshri said users watched 4 million streams from the site within the first two weeks of its launch in November; the site plans to begin selling advertising this month. The company is still feeling its way in terms of what to do about piracy. "Vivah" and other new films on the site are protected from piracy by digital rights management software, and content available through video streaming cannot be copied. However, the older films are not protected from piracy if they are downloaded.
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