PVR, Oma Cinemas tie-up to enhance luxury offerings

Leading cinemas chain PVR Cinemas on Thursday said it has entered into an exclusive tie-up with France-based Ōma Cinema to strengthen its premium cinema play. Created by renowned French architect Pierre Chican, Oma Cinema is known for its proprietary concept of unique tiered balconies, also known as pods, inspired by the design of opera houses enabling viewers to have a sociable and intimate cinema experience.

The partners made the announcement at the CinemaCon 2022 at Las Vegas.

“We will be among the first 50 countries to have signed up with Oma Cinema to bring in this unique concept to our properites. Post-pandemic, consumers are increasingly looking at premium experience at the cinemas. We will initially look at introducing this concept in the top metros but also see the potential of taking this concept to tier-2 markets in the coming years,” Pramod Arora, Chief Growth and Strategy Officer, PVR Ltd told BusinessLine.

“ We have been building cinemas with more experiential elements and concepts to create a strong differentiator . OMA pods will offer an option to consumers to have a private movie party with friends and families. They will enable us to offer consumer groups their own space for a bespoke experience of watching a film on the large screen along with especially crafted F&B options,” Arora explained.

PVR said it will need to work with local authorities to get regulatory clearances to introduce this concept to India either in its existing cinemas or in new projects. “ We can expect to see the first cinema with OMA pods coming out of our stable over the next year after all the aspects are worked out,” added Arora.

Nicolas Chican, Co-founder & Partner of Oma Cinema, said that the OMA Cinema’s key focus is to combine the big screen experience with privacy. “ We are excited to bring about the unique and proprietary concept of Cinema pods to India with this exclusive tie-up with PVR. Our designs ensure that each pod within an auditoria is unique and designed to perfection,” he said.

“The streaming OTT services have somewhat commoditised content consumption and we believe its important that movie theatres strengthen their position as key entertainment destinations,” Chican added.

PVR has been expanding its luxury format offerings over the years and recently launched its Rooftop Drive-in Theatre at Jio World Drive in Mumbai in association with Reliance Jio Drive-In as well as Maison PVR, a six- screen uber-luxury multiplex cinema in Mumbai. The Hindu BusinessLine