Under a new leadership, Discovery Communications India is crafting a blueprint to regain relevance in the television domain with its foray in the sports broadcasting space through the launch of DSport. Aiming to increase original content to 200 hours in 2017, the network has invested heavily in reaching out to the masses, increasing the local play and reinventing the channels. In conversation with BrandWagon’s Chandni Mathur, Discovery Networks’ Karan Bajaj highlights the three pronged strategy for the network ahead. Excerpts:

Discovery Networks is undergoing a transformation with a whole new team at the helm. What is your vision for the network and what are the changes you are bringing in?

The overall vision is to widen the footprint of Discovery in India by going deeper to the consumers that we are trying to serve. A portion of that is going to be organic by reinventing the core channels to become more mass-focussed while the other route is inorganic.

When I thought about the organic reinvention of core channels, I realised we are going after tier 2 and 3 consumer markets, and creating propositions for them in programming. So, we needed a very different skill set in terms of people who are able to do local content but don’t come from a GEC type of background. This is because our content is going to be local and entertaining yet purposeful and fact driven. So we had to find the perfect intersection of people who are very passionate about the purpose and yet know how to tell larger than life entertaining stories.

What kind of organic and inorganic growth opportunities has the network identified?

The aim is to consolidate our presence in non-fiction. We are looking at other genres and spaces, where there are unmet needs for consumers. Sports and kids are the two focus areas. Our organic growth plan will see us heavily invest in widening our reach as we look to target the masses. The network will see a revamp as we grow our existing categories with localisation and expand into popular yet under-served categories by June, 2017. Our inorganic growth plan is being led by the launch of DSport, as we continue to identify more spaces where we want to be present.

Indian sports broadcasting has become a duopoly market. How do you intend to break through?

DSport is the first step in our aggressive expansion strategy and we will bring over 4,000 hours of live content per year, focussing less on talk shows and more on the sport. Our key offerings are horse-racing, rugby, soccer, golf, cycling and motor sports, among others. Our strategy was to get popular but under-served sports to audiences. We won’t be making any flashy acquisitions and will focus on getting properties which give scale. We don’t want to spread ourselves too thin in buying properties.

Will you look at cricketing properties including IPL?

We have very scalable properties to start with but we do have a long horizon. Anything which meets the criteria of being popular — like an IPL, is catering to the unmet needs of consumers and if we can add something to the mix, then we definitely will look at acquiring the property. We are already in advanced discussions for a number of cricket properties, which we will announce in the future.

What are the grey areas within the network? Does Investigation Discovery require special attention?

We are starting with the big networks first — Discovery and TLC, and then Kids, which we think will be a big network. We are seeing what the purpose of the brand is, the consumer it is serving and the proposition. We will ask the same questions for ID as well; I don’t think it requires any separate attention. My priority is the top channels’ reinvention and then I am going to go to the next level with ID, Science and Turbo and see what unique role they can serve versus Discovery and TLC, and accordingly we will push them in that direction.

Kids is a priority area for the network, but are you satisfied with the performance of Discovery Kids?

Globally, sports and kids is the focus ahead but in India we have just gotten into sports, and Kids is something we are looking into. We might make some different decisions in India. I am not satisfied with the performance of Discovery Kids. My ambition is to grow Kids to become a top three network from its current eighth or ninth position in a very short period of time and we are creating a pretty robust plan around it.

Talks of acquiring FoodFood fell through. Why?

There were requirements that needed to be met by both the parties, for which we couldn’t mutually reach a conclusion. But FoodFood can be a powerful brand for other people. For us, it didn’t seem like a mutual fit.

What are your plans on the digital front? Is an OTT platform part of your core strategy?

OTT is not something we should enter because many platforms exist in this market, customer acquisition costs are through the roof, retention is very difficult and it’s not a profitable game for a very long period of time. We are co-creating properties with digital brands and partners. We are very focussed when we acquire IP now that it has to be very remarkable and has legs in both linear and digital. Apart from an OTT platform, we are doing everything else.

What is your view on the performance of regional language feeds?

Discovery is predominantly an international channel right now and our first step is to localise as 70% of the Indian market is HSM. Then we will create regional content. By the end of 2017, it will be a 50% local and 50% international channel. From a consumer perspective, a 100% local channel is not needed. The approach that I don’t agree with is that you do one thing and it translates everywhere. To be regional, you have to be a ground-up regional player. We have Discovery Tamil which is our predominant feed. It’s doing reasonably well and we are doing heavy localisation on Tamil as we do heavy localisation in HSM markets as well.

Chandni.Mathur@expressindia.com
@chandni_mathur