Future Of The Broadcast Market

The Indian broadcast industry is moving toward a different direction. With ease of regulatory barriers and advancement of broadband capabilities and emerging of new technologies like VoD and OTT, broadcasters are now focusing more on quality service to customers, in terms of content access anytime from anywhere.

Broadcasters are now more content providers rather than only TV channels. The strategy of broadcasters is now defined in a new way. They focus on the interests of audience, fast content delivery, and access of multiple devices. Also broadcasters are now more concerned about HD and even 4K content in India. Most of the production houses are producing 4K content and delivering to audiences via cloud-based platforms. The best example is YouTube, where not only 4K, but also virtual reality and 360 video content are available. There is a huge craze among viewers for these types of content and the new market in broadcasting is only in content. The more content a company has, the more it can earn. Even the gaming industry, which is also now in the field of making 4K content-based games, has now almost merged with the broadcast industry.

With new technologies like video over IP, the broadcast industry has taken a drastic turn. This has reduced the cost of infrastructure to a great extent. Also AI-enabled handheld devices also play an important role in content distribution. The devices can keep a record of what the user is watching over the cloud and accordingly the broadcaster and even advertiser can know the user’s region of interest. AI can not only track the interest of the consumer but also his comfortable timing for viewing content.

The new trend of broadcasting is cloud platform-based and interactive. The advantage of broadcasting content over the cloud is reduced distribution cost which is involved for satellite channels. Even advertising agencies have changed their way of marketing products. They are more into social media targeting all categories of crowds. Also they use mobile-based applications and web channels as platforms to do marketing of products.

Global VoD players such as Netflix, amazon, and yupp TV are making early in-roads with different strategies to capture the Indian market. Similarly Indian players like Hotstar and Sony Liv are following them. The key strategy of Indian players is to add regional content alongside international content that suits viewers from all regions of the country.

Not only video content, even the print media is using the digital platform for broadcasting. They are using more mobile apps for targeting their customers. Digitization has its impact not only on media but also other sectors like education, medical, and agriculture.

Having said so, it is not that satellite TV has come to an end. There are still lot of channels broadcast over satellites and lot more are planning for the same. If we talk about India, there are still more than 70 percent of customers who need morning newspapers and watch TV on traditional devices. There are still few areas where there is no reach of internet and mobile network, where satellite is the only option. So the transition to digital media will take more time.

Summarizing, broadcasters and content providers have different strategies for the Indian market but their motive is the same which is to satisfy customer interests with fast and reliable content access. They can now target customers not only in a specific region, but also worldwide. Content providers and broadcasters are now responding more to the evolving trend of the broadcast industry which will dictate the future of television. They are developing relationships with viewers directly and by using technology like AI-based mobile apps, they can get the data analysis from viewers and accordingly deliver the content to keep their viewers engaged.