JioCinema's deal with NBCUniversal to boost its subscription revenue and premium customer base in India: Karan Taurani

As NBCUniversal (NBCU) and JioCinema, Viacom18’s streaming service, entered into a multi-year partnership to bring NBCU films and TV series to India, Karan Taurani, Senior Analyst at Elara Capital said that getting a large catalogue of Hollywood content is JioCinema’s serious effort to expand its premium customer base.

“Rs 1,000 subscription is something which every customer may not pay for just Warner Bros' content that they had earlier signed in terms of the deal and HBO content as well. As a platform, they were only competing with the likes of platforms like broadcast OTTs like Zee5, Disney Plus and SonyLiv given the sports, GEC and movie content they have. With this kind of expansion in Hollywood content, they are going to compete very hard even with the platforms like Netflix and Amazon Prime. More so Netflix they have got a huge variety of global content catalogue,” Taurani said.

Furthermore, he went on to say that, “JioCinema could emerge the number one app in the country in terms of overall size and scale because of the fillip they would get from IPL ad revenue. But this kind of initiative will also lead to a big boost in terms of their subscription revenue and also in terms of their premium customer base. It's quite a serious threat to the industry and their plans seem to be quite aggressive in the way they are approaching their content strategy on both sides - sports, GEC and movie content and also the English premium content.” he added.

This partnership aims to bolster JioCinema’s program offering and ensures that their viewers will be able to enjoy titles from NBCU’s content portfolio. It aims to leverage JioCinema’s reach and expertise to introduce Indian audiences to the Peacock brand and NBCU’s portfolio.

The portfolio is fuelled by Comcast NBCUniversal’s production entities and brands, which include Universal Television, UCP, Universal International Studios, Universal Television Alternative Studio, Sky Studios, DreamWorks Animation, Universal Pictures, Focus Features, Bravo, and more.

NBCU’s programming will live in a Peacock branded hub starting next month on JioCinema’s newly announced “JioCinema Premium” SVOD tier.

Here, viewers will have access to first-run series like ‘Young Rock’, a comedy starring actor Dwayne Johnson that tells the story of his life and the people he’s met along the way; action thriller ‘The Lazarus Project’; and The Lovers, a dark romantic comedy-drama.

Indian audiences can also enjoy Peacock Originals - including Bel-Air, the reimagining of the ‘90s comedy series that starred Will Smith; Pitch Perfect: Bumper in Berlin, a spin-off series starring Adam Devine who reprises his character from the film; and more. Other dramas and comedies from NBCU’s library - including Downton Abbey, Suits, The Office, Parks and Recreation and The Mindy Project, are also a part of this deal.

Further contributing to JioCinema’s SVOD line-up at launch will be the streaming premieres of movies from the Hollywood studio. This includes DreamWorks Animation’s Oscar-nominated Puss in Boots: The Last Wish, and the sci-fi horror film M3GAN, from James Wan (producer of The Conjuring, Annabelle) and Blumhouse. Joining these recent hits will be the Jurassic, Bourne, Shrek, The Mummy and Pitch Perfect franchises. 

Movies from the Despicable Me/Minions and Fast franchises, including the newly released Fast X, as well as The Super Mario Bros. Movie and the IMAX-shot epic thriller ‘Oppenheimer’ from Christopher Nolan, will also be heading to the service in the future.

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