Rajan Singh, Executive Vice President-International Business, Sony Entertainment Television Asia

Rajan Singh is the Executive Vice President for Sony Entertainment Television (SET) Asia, and is the highest-ranking executive in the South Asian pay TV market. He is responsible for all territories outside the Indian Sub-continent, and under his wings, the brand Sony has become a multi-million pound profit centre, with business operations running in over 100 countries.

Prior to joining SET Asia, Singh was CEO for Zee TV UK/Europe for four years. He was earlier MD of East FM, the first 24-hour radio service in East Africa. He has also been Non-Executive Director for Leicestershire Promotions, where his key focus was inward investment. Singh is also an Advisor to IIC that runs the Leicestershire Cricket Club.

Singh's astute knowledge and drive has taken his career to a meteoric rise at a young age. With this in mind, he has found himself working with a diversity of people from locals from his hometown of Leicestershire to politicians, Bollywood filmmakers and CEOs of multinationals.

In this interview with exchange4media's Rishi Vora, Singh talks about the international television scene, SET Asia's global operations, and more. Excerpts:

Q. Do you think Indian soaps will continue to flourish in the international markets?

Absolutely! It goes without saying that the international market for soaps is phenomenal. Soaps are playing an important role, while reality shows are also doing well in the international markets.

Importantly for us, NRIs have special interest in Bollywood movies and titles, and keeping in mind their affection for Bollywood films, Sony decided to release a couple of recent films like 'Chak De! India' and 'Saawariya' for the international market. We have also tied up with well-known distributors like Yash Raj and Eros. I think this connection with Bollywood movies and distributors is the key differentiating factor for us in overseas markets.

The Indian market is very different and has no bearing on the international market. International markets are open to do what they want to. For example, in Africa, there is no restriction in rates. You do what you need to do, and the market forces will follow. The same is in the US and the UK. Thus, the Indian model is very different from other countries. In terms of distribution worldwide, we are on every available platform – be it the DTH or the cable, in all countries around the world.

For global operations we have SET Asia, which is literally controlled from London. We look after all the satellite beats around the world, including Africa, the Middle East, Canada, the US, South America, Australasia and others. Basically, everything outside India is handled by London and we have satellites for all these places.

Primarily, we have two operations. One is what we call DTH, which is through satellite, and the other one is cable operation. All territories that we cover around the world have both these operations. Since both DTH and cable are pay television structures, NRIs have to pay on a regular basis to watch our channels.

The latest development is what we have done in the UK market, and is one of the highlights for us. We have taken a first step into what the future should be, in terms of consolidation of the markets. We are the first channel internationally that is trying to rope in other channels, partner with them and create an Asian bouquet. This would make life simpler for consumers, and we will offer far more attractive and reasonable rates. We have joined hands with third party channels like Sahara, ARY, and Aaj Tak that form a part of the bouquet, which is marketed and distributed by SET.

Moreover, among the other GECs, I think Sony is the only channel that gives you synchronised telecast with India. As I said earlier, we keep no time lag or delay in the programmes between India and other countries. Other channels, if I am not mistaken, delay telecast by about a week. For example, 'Indian Idol' being aired at 9 pm IST would be telecast at 9 pm local time of the UK, the US and around the world.

If you are in a pay TV market, you cannot change your strategy on a daily basis. It is important for us to have a consistent and balanced strategy over a period of time because the subscriber pays each month. So, we need to know whether the viewer would be paying next month or not. Thus, it becomes important for us to have a consistent strategy, and we cannot afford to cut, chop or change strategies on a regular basis.

I set up East FM and that was the first-ever Indian radio station in Nairobi, Kenya. Although there was a huge market in Nairobi, nobody actually got a radio station just for the Indians. We managed that with the license from the Government, and within the first year of the business, we started making profits. So, FM is very good in the key markets, but the only problem is that there are limits on the number of radio stations. But the one positive thing about radio stations is that the cost is low and the proportion of the revenue is higher as compared to some other media.

One thing that is a common denominator between what Sony has been doing over the years is about having a marketing-based approach. It is about listening to your customers, getting the right look and feel for the channel. We are glad that we have been doing this throughout, and have been successful in taking the same philosophy into its overseas markets.

Yes, we do have a tie-up in this regard. Considering the growth of Indian advertisers who want to promote or place ads internationally, we thought we should develop a specialist agency that would take care of this. So, we chose Prime Time, an independent agency within India, to look after our international businesses.

Prime Time's job is to get companies from India and coordinate their international businesses with us. So, we use Prime Time's specialty in terms of using their knowledge on the Indian and international markets. We have been working together for more than five years now and are looking forward to working together closely on a long-term basis.

Ad rates for the rest of Asia is slightly different from what we have in India because we are a specialist channel in that region and thus, our reach and audience become very specialist. Secondly, the market dynamics are completely different.

Ad sales in India are purely based on TRP numbers, and the rates are decided on how much the programme's or the channel's rating is. But internationally, it doesn't happen that way. The advertising model is very different in the overseas markets, where the profile of viewers is different from that of viewers in India.

In terms of viewership, it is difficult to tell. For example, distribution in Pakistan will give you 10 million homes, and distribution in the Middle East will give you 300,000 homes, and 500,000 homes in the US. I would say the overall viewership is around 100 million. But you can't really say how accurate these figures are since NRIs keep migrating in and out of countries.

Talking about the size of the business, we have noticed an increase in the business by 70 per cent. I am sure that with passage of time, revenue figures would gradually increase.

In terms of revenues, I think we contribute 20 per cent of the revenue and 50 per cent of the profitability. International revenues are increasing every year and we are generating somewhere in the region of 40 million a year.

Both companies work in different ways, but the end result is always the same. The goal remains the same anywhere – to maximise profits and provide content to NRIs around the world. The only difference I find is that Zee has a different operation internationally than SET Asia. All I can say is that unlike Zee, we are more alike SET India.

Internationally we have major events, like we have our own sports events and Bollywood awards, in addition to 'Boogie Woogie' around the world. We have a programme for the high society people of Dubai, and a Pakistani show called 'Volume' for the Pakistani viewers. We also cover major events that take place around the world. So yes, we do customise our content for our local territories.

Telephone voting existed 5-7 years ago in the international markets. In some of the territories, we also have the use of the red or blue button, which is an interface between the set-top box and the service provider. With this, the viewer can vote not just using the phone line, but also the set-top box.

Interactivity in India has reached the next stage, where you don't just require the telephone line to generate interactivity. You can actually send live messages, you can select randomly a play list and decide what you want to watch. So, I think India has already gone to the next level in terms of interactivity.

This does not affect us. It's a tiff between the Indian broadcasters, the clients and the AAAI. It's a domestic issue and applies to only Indian businesses and the IBF-related subsidiaries in India.

I think we are fortunate that international businesses are far more regulated, and that issues like these don't usually crop up. The reason why these things are happening in India is that the Indian broadcasting industry is still at the nascent stage, and that it has no single regulator who can take care of this.

There are a lot of Indian companies who are now pushing their products on to our channels to distribute them around the world. Also, I think today it's not just the old traditional markets like the US and the UK, but it is about Australia, Africa, and other emerging markets where Indian companies now want to distribute their products. We take this opportunity via our channel to get their message across all international markets.

In terms of content management, there aren't many common grounds, except for the fixed point chart or FPC, which enables to determine whether we want to take a particular programme for the international market or not, or whether we want to replace it with the local content. Normally, as a strategy, we keep the international prime hours exactly the same as India's. But there might be a few exceptions here and there where we abandon programmes that are inappropriate for international markets and which are aired in India. There are other regulatory constraints as well, wherein some territories might not allow viewers to pay for certain products, and so we have to take them off.

Business models are more through subscriptions rather than ad revenues. Ad revenue is what I would say ‘icing on the cake'. A substantial amount of revenue – nearly 80 per cent – is generated from the subscription model.

Radio is a completely different medium. For example, you can play a song 10 times a day and the customer would like it. If you do the same thing on TV and play a programme a couple of times a day, they will definitely switch you off.