OTT firm MX Player aims to increase user base by 50 million

OTT firm MX Player which offers web series, music, gaming and short videos free of cost to users, has set a target to increase its domestic user base by 50 million to 250 million (25 crore) this year, a top executive said.

It is a free eco-system downloadable app, wherein most people can consume content in multiple languages free of cost.

This year, MX Player said it is trying to achieve at least 20% pie of what the other big players are getting in terms of ad sales, said Nikhil Gandhi, COO, MX Media Private Ltd.

“In our growth journey towards profit, we have created two unicorns. MX Takatak and MX Player in the last three years. We are more interested in value creation than valuation,” he said.

“Our profitability is slated for the next 24-36 months and the scale that we are looking at achieving this year (2022) is the first stepping stone to that,” he added.

Mr. Gandhi said that the firm would expand the international footprint of its local video player to more than 250 countries (around 90% of the total global base).

He claimed that said that MX Player, the Indian OTT major, is the largest video playback player in the world with a global base of 300 million users.

The company is also planning to widen its distribution by making OTT services, which appeal to Indian users globally (diaspora) to 18 countries from around 12 countries currently.

Its biggest markets include the U.S., the U.K., Australia, Middle East and now South Asia, Mr Gandhi said.

It also plans to add more local languages to the current bouquet of content offering in 10 languages, including Hindi, Tamil, Telugu, Kannada and Marathi, among others.

“MX Player’s super-app user base of 300 million globally, including 200 million users in India, makes MX Player the second largest video platform in India after Youtube,” Mr. Gandhi, who was earlier with Tik Tok, said.

Speaking about the firm’s business model he said, “Entertainment becomes luxury for people due to the hefty subscription being charged by most leading MNC and Indian OTT players.”

“Our business model is based on advertising though we unveiled a feature recently wherein consumers can subscribe to our ad-free feature by paying a nominal charge of ₹199 for the whole year,” Mr. Gandhi added.

Stating that the firm was investing big in compression technology as well as making the user experience more meaningful, he said technology was making advertising target oriented and sharp.

“We have already begun geo tagging local ads with our latest show with Kangana Ranaut called Lock Upp reality show in which 13 celebrities were put together in a jail to compete with each other,” said Mr. Gandhi.

MX Player also intends to invest in content, including 35 new shows post Alt Balaji’s Lock Upp and Ram Gopal Varma’s Dhahanam, including season 3 of Ashram featuring Bobby Deo, he said.

The firm is also planning to unveil a separate gaming app which is currently in Beta testing mode. The Hindu